Lars von Trier

[yoloswegmaster]

MUBI has the rights to 11 Lars von Trier films, most newly restored: The Idiots, Dogville, The Five Obstructions, Manderlay, The Boss of it All, Breaking the Waves, Europa Trilogy (The Element of Crime, Epidemic, Europa), Antichrist & Dancer in the Dark.

I wonder if this means that the Criterion releases of the Europa trilogy and Antichrist will be going OOP soon.

[therewillbeblus]

MUBI has the rights to 11 Lars von Trier films, most newly restored: The Idiots, Dogville, The Five Obstructions, Manderlay, The Boss of it All, Breaking the Waves, Europa Trilogy (The Element of Crime, Epidemic, Europa), Antichrist & Dancer in the Dark.

I wonder if this means that the Criterion releases of the Europa trilogy and Antichrist will be going OOP soon.

How come? MUBI is UK, and have physical editions of Drive My Car, Petite Maman, and The Worst Person in the World alongside in-print Criterion releases

This is really exciting news. I'll feel more optimistic about them prioritizing physical media LvT releases once their restored Riget comes out, which they've been sitting on for around six months now

[yoloswegmaster]

I should have specified that they have the North American rights to those films.

I'm personally hoping for a release of The Idiots soon.

[The Elegant Dandy Fop]

I'm truly shocked they remastered The Idiots in 4K. If it angered people upon its original release, I'm curious to see how people would react to it today. Regardless, it's my favorite von Trier and am very excited to see it restored.

[therewillbeblus]

Oh okay, exciting! The Idiots and Manderlay are definitely priorities for HD

[The Fanciful Norwegian]

The restoration of The Idiots has been kicking around online for a few months. It's essentially the opposite of what happened with The Celebration, in that they didn't touch the original DV materials and instead did a 4K scan of the 35mm film-out. So it has all of the degradation associated with that era of video-to-film transfers and isn't a huge improvement over the Electric Parc DVD. But of course it preserves the way the film was originally presented, which is a nice change given that von Trier hasn't been too concerned about that in other recent restorations (Breaking the Waves, The Kingdom).

I should have specified that they have the North American rights to those films.

It sounds like they only have theatrical and streaming, or at any rate there's no mention of any physical home releases to come.

[dwk]

I wonder if this means that the Criterion releases of the Europa trilogy and Antichrist will be going OOP soon.

I would assume those releases and Breaking the Waves. will go OOP whenever their current licenses expire. The article mentions films from the new deal will be added to MUBI through September 2025, so, hopefully, the Blu-rays will, at least, be available through the rest of this year.

[criterionsnob]

The Idiots is being released theatrically for its 25th anniversary by Mubi. Streaming on Mubi July 7.

Trailer

[yoloswegmaster]

LvT boxset coming from Artifical Eye in September. It seems to be missing Dancer in the Dark and the Riget series. Breaking the Waves will also be released seperately in 4K.

[domino harvey]

Whoa, Manderlay, nice!

[aox]

It's been 20 years. Will he ever make Wasington (SIC)?

[colinr0380]

I would doubt it, not least because unless one was done at the time there could not be another John Hurt narration.

[jegharfangetmigenmyg]

I highly doubt it, too. Although, he did manage to finish the Riget/Kingdom trilogy almost three decades after the second season, and with many of the original cast members gone (which, incidentally, was the original reason he never finished it). But I think most, and IIRC including Von Trier, saw Manderlay as a bit of a failure. There's only so much you can do with format of the USA trilogy. Unless he's capable of producing a really mindblowing script (I don't think he has written it yet), it would almost certainly end up as a poor man's version of Dogville, just like Manderlay.

[colinr0380]

I feel more positive about Manderlay, though also feel that a trilogy would probably be unnecessary since having the point-counterpoint of just two films seems to work better as a contrast (I also have my doubts that political discourse in the United States is mature or complex enough to be able to accommodate three facets. Maybe that was what Von Trier realised, and could stand as his most damning statement of all? ). The naive doormat learning to fight back with retributive violence, and Daddy's arsenal, in Dogville was probably always going to be the 'easier' version of the story compared to Manderlay's approach of someone coming into a pre-existing situation with 'all the answers' and ability to bluntly reshape things more 'equitably' by force, but in their top-down approach towards people management and imposing change without really understanding the complex motivations underpinning the society that has built up around the plantation only exposing Grace's naivete and vulnerability to exploitation in an entirely different way from when she was too passive.

Including the perhaps difficult to tackle notion of groups of people wanting to be exploited in order to have an assurance of a stable control structure to 'safely rebel' against within a safe framework of nothing major actually changing to affect everyone's livelihoods and well-defined status within the society. As well as specific individual people existing in difficult situations, or even expelled from the community, but either way trying to figure out a way to make their circumstances work for them (something which makes the Timothy character seem very similar to the character of Kichijiro in Scorsese's version of Silence, except with an added component of sexual attraction being played upon)

[domino harvey]

Yes, I think Manderlay is one of the most genuinely provocative filmic works of race commentary I can think of, regardless of the staging gimmick being carbon copied. Von Trier gives exceedingly uncomfortable answers to questions no one wants to ask and paints a grim portrait of America’s historic and ongoing problems that doesn’t flatter liberal voices by telling them they’re doing great

[mrb404]

A more complete edition of LvT's work is also coming up from Potemkine in France on November 7. This one includes Dancer in the Dark and a number of made for TV movies, shorts and documentaries (but still no Riget series). Some of these might be part of 12 hours of special features on the Curzon boxset but I can't find a detailed listing for comparison.
Although the FNAC lists it as an exclusive, it is also seems to be available from other online shops.
Of course, the subtitles can be a problem (for non-English films and the many special features) as only French seems to be present.

Here are the details from the FNAC listing:

Feature films:
- Element of crime (1984)
- Epidemic (1987)
- Europa (1991)
- Breaking the waves (1996)
- Les Idiots (1998)
- Dancer in the dark (2000)
- Dogville (2003)
- Five Obstructions (2003)
- Manderlay (2005)
- Le Direktor (2006)
- Antichrist (2009)
- Melancholia (2011)
- Nymphomaniac director's cut (2013)
- The House That Jack Built (2018)

Bonus Téléfilms + courts métrages :
- Medea (téléfilm INEDIT)
- D-Dag (téléfilm INEDIT)
- Turen Til Squashland (court métrage INEDIT)
- Menthe la bienheureuse (court métrage INEDIT)
- Nocturne (court métrage INEDIT)
- Images of Relief (court métrage INEDIT)

Bonus Documentaires + interviews :
- Transformer de Stig Bjorkman (INEDIT)
- L'image originelle de Pierre-Henri Gibert
- Interview Joachim Trier (INEDIT
- Interview Gaspar Noé (INEDIT)
- Interview Olivier Assayas + Bertrand Mandico (INEDIT)
- Table ronde Festival de La Rochelle (INEDIT)
- The Missing Films de Jacob Thuesen et Tomas Gislason ?

Bonus Element of crime :
- Commentaire audio de LVT, Tom Elling et Tomas Gislason
- Commentaire audio de Peter Schepelern et Stig Bjorkman
- Ennenstadt Europa, about Lars von Trier and "The Element Of Crime"
- Storyboarding Element of Crime with cinematographer Tom Elling
- Anecdotes from "The Element Of Crime"

Bonus Epidemic :
- Commentaire audio de LVT et Niels Vorsel
- Anecdotes from "Epidemic"
- Interview de LVT dans une émission TV danoise (V2 Fakta)
- From Dreyer to von Trier de Michael Sandager (INEDIT)

Bonus Europa :
- Commentaire audio de LVT et Peter Aalbaek Jensen
- Commentaire audio de LVT, Jean-Marc Barr et Udo Kier
- The making of "Europa"
- Anecdotes from "Europa"
- The emotional music script for Europa
- Lars von Trier, anecdotes
- Conversation entre LVT et Bo Green Jensen sur la trilogie Europa
- Triers element

Bonus Breaking the waves :
- Scènes coupées commentées
- Clip promotionnel réalisé pour le festival de Cannes 1996
- Hommage à Katrin Cartlidge
- Casting commenté d'Emily Watson
- Interview d'Adrian Rawlins, acteur du film
- Interview Emily Watson 2023 ?

Bonus Les Idiots :
- Lars Von Trier & The Idiot All Stars: You're a Lady (video music) (INEDIT)
- Interview de LVT par Yves Montmayeur (INEDIT)
- Retour sur Les Idiots de Erik Lennart Petersen (INEDIT)

Bonus Dancer in the dark :
- Von Trier's 100 Eyes by Katia Forbert

Bonus Dogville :
- Commentaires audio LVT et Anthony Dod Mantle (chef op)
- Dogville: The Pilot
- Dogville Confessions by Sami Saif
- Trier, Kidman et Cannes
- 2 interviews de Lars Von Trier
- 2 interviews de Nicole Kidman
- Interview de Stellan Skarsgard
- Interview de l'assistant Réalisateur Anders Refn
- Interview du Producteur Vibeke Windelov
- Les 6 semaines de confessions
- Les effets spéciaux commentés par Peter Hjorth, responsable des effets
- Les projets d'affiches avec les commentaires écrits sur chacun des projet
- Conférences de presse : Trollhättan 2003, Cannes 2003, Cannes 2003 (rencontre avec la presse danoise)
- Virginie Apiou "Les personnages féminins chez LVT" (INEDIT)

Bonus Manderlay :
- The Road to Manderlay by Carsten Bramsen
- Entretien avec Lars Von Trier
- Entretien avec son biographe américain

Bonus The Direktor :
- Occupations (Chacun son cinéma)

Bonus Antichrist :
- Commentaire audio de LVT
- Confidences de Charlotte Gainsbourg
- Antichrist au Festival de Cannes 2009
- Interview de Willem Dafoe
- Confessions de LVT
- L'identité visuelle du film
- L'identité musicale et sonore du film
- La création des décors
- La Femme, instrument du diable
- La pré-production
- Les trois mendiants
- Les effets spéciaux

Bonus Melancholia :
- Commentaire audio
- Autour du film
- Esthétique du film
- Les effets spéciaux
- Eclairage scientifique
- Philippe Rouyer "La fin du monde chez LVT" (INEDIT)

Bonus Nymphomaniac director's cut :
- Plus c'est long, plus c'est bon de Philippe Rouyer
- Entretien avec Stacy Martin
- Entretien avec Shia LaBeouf
- Entretien avec Charlotte Gainsbourg
- Entretien avec Stellan Skarsgard
- Entretien avec Jorgen Leth par Philippe Rouyer

Bonus The House That Jack Built :
- Interview Lars von Trier
- Analyse Pacôme
- Analyse Stéphane

[colinr0380]

D-Day surfacing somewhere is very exciting. That is a kind of live performance piece on New Year's Eve 1999 where each actor in a drama had a different director ordering them around. It is interesting to compare that to Mike Figgis' Timecode, where instead of duelling directors behind the scenes in D-Day (which eventually makes it a somewhat solipsistic and academic exercise with limited application to the 'real world'. Looking forward to The Five Obstructions) instead the 'control' over what to focus on is given over more to the audience. I could imaging the notion of giving the audience (let alone the actors) that kind of power would be anaethema to Lars Von Trier though!

[The Fanciful Norwegian]

Curious if the mention of D-Dag refers to von Trier's contribution (Lise) or to the 2001 version edited from all four directors' films. The former would obviously make the most sense but also kind of defeats the aim of the project. I believe it's possible to recreate the original broadcast on Blu-ray by authoring the four films as multiple angles with their own audio tracks, but I very much doubt anyone will ever bother to do that.

Also curious to see how Dancer in the Dark looks and whether it's been remastered a la The Idiots (from the 35mm film-out) or The Celebration (from the digital source). There are German and Japanese BDs from film masters but I doubt they came from Zentropa.

[diamonds]

Von Trier is taking applications for a girlfriend/muse

[therewillbeblus]

I admire the candidness

[furbicide]

If he's serious, I hope he finds happiness and companionship out of this. I would also kind of love to know how many responses he gets and how he plans to vet applicants, because I assume "muse" entails some kind of acting ability? It's a lot to ask of one person!

[colinr0380]

Breaking out the wig and lipstick right now! Although on a more serious note, it is not a light thing to live with somebody struggling with Parkinsons and be able to gently help them with that incredibly frustrating condition.

[swo17]

LvT boxset coming from Artifical Eye in September.

I got this if anyone has questions. A few things I've observed so far:

- You'll need a long table to unfold either of the disc holders enough to get to some of the discs. The five obstructions indeed.
- Like Nymph()maniac, The House That Jack Built is only presented in the director's cut. I think I prefer the theatrical cut of this film, as the added gore in the director's cut looks distractingly fake.
- I suspect Antichrist has the same disc contents as AE's prior release. This is in 1080i/50 which I believe is truer to the theatrical experience than Criterion's 1080p and causes the film to run almost 5 minutes shorter, in case you only have 1 hr 45 min before you have to be somewhere where you'll be expected to have just watched the film. I think Criterion's image looks slightly (perhaps imperceptibly) better. Extras seem to be more or less the same between the two discs, give or take.
- I briefly compared the discs for the Europe trilogy to those from the Criterion set. Image seemed about even between the two. Commentaries and a lot of the other extras appear to be duplicated between the two releases, but I didn't see the short films Nocturne and Images of Liberation on the Curzon discs. However, the Epidemic disc does include Medea as a bonus feature. It looks terrible, but I assume it's comparable to the Facets DVD.
- The Five Obstructions disc unfortunately does not include Jørgen Leth's The Perfect Human like the Koch Lorber DVD, but it does include von Trier's 1978 short The Orchid Gardener! Has this been released on disc before? Apparently he started making short films a decade earlier at the age of 10(!) but this was his debut as "Lars von Trier."
- The first seven discs are green and the rest red, because Christmas?

Actually, here's a full list of bonus features by disc:

SpoilerShow

THE ELEMENT OF CRIME
Anecdotes from The Element of Crime - a Behind the Scenes documentary
A Conversation with Lars von Trier & Bo Green Jensen about the Europe Trilogy
Storyboarding The Element of Crime - Featurette with Cinematographer Tom Elling
The Cultural Focus: Portrait of Lars von Trier - Featurette
Commentaries with Lars von Trier, Tom Elling, Tómas Gislason, Peter Schepelern and Stig Björkman
Theatrical Trailer

EPIDEMIC
Medea (1988) - TV Movie directed by Lars von Trier
Anecdotes from Epidemic - a Behind the Scenes documentary
Commentary by Director Lars von Trier and Co-Star Niels Vørsel

EUROPA
Anecdotes from Europa - a Behind the Scenes documentary
The Making of Europa
Commentaries with Lars von Trier, Aalbæk Jensen, Jean-Marc Barr and Udo Kier
From Dreyer to von Trier - An Interview with Cinematographer Henning Bendtsen
The Emotional Music Script Featurette with composer Joachim Holbek
The Faecal Location - Featurette
Theatrical Trailer

BREAKING THE WAVES
Commentary with Lars von Trier and Anders Refn
Excerpts from Tranceformer - A Portrait of Lars von Trier (1997)
Interview with Adrian Rawlins
Casting Tape
Promo Clip
Deleted and Extended Scenes
Theatrical Trailers

THE IDIOTS
The Humiliated (1998) - The Making of The Idiots
The Purified (2003)
Dogma Waves from the North - a web conversation with Lars von Trier
Looking Back at the Idiots - a Behind the Scenes documentary
Idiotic Filters - a Behind the Scenes documentary
Nikolaj Lie Kaas & Lars von Trier and the Idiot All Stars - Dogma Music Video
Lars von Trier - Cannes Interview
Theatrical Trailer

DOGVILLE
Confessions from Dogville
Lars von Trier meets the Scandinavian Press
Lars von Trier & Nicole Kidman first Press Conference in Trollhättan
Lars von Trier & Nicole Kidman - Cannes Film Festival Press Conference
Interview with Nicole Kidman
Lars von Trier & the Visual Effects of Dogville
Theatrical Trailer

THE FIVE OBSTRUCTIONS
The Orchid Gardener (1978) - short film directed by Lars von Trier
Introduction by Ari Aster: Musings on Lars von Trier
Theatrical Trailer

MANDERLAY
Interviews with cast & crew
Interviews with Lars von Trier and cast at the Cannes Scandinavian Press Conference
Visual Effects in the Making of Manderlay
Cannes Experience - a Behind the Scenes documentary
The Road to Manderlay - a Behind the Scenes documentary
Commentary with Lars von Trier and cinematographer Anthony Dod Mantle
Theatrical Trailer

THE BOSS OF IT ALL
The Foreigners of it All - a Behind the Scenes mockumentary
The Director of it All - interview with Lars von Trier
Automavision - A New Set of Rules - a Behind the Scenes documentary

ANTICHRIST
Interviews with cast
Commentary with Lars von Trier T & Prof. Murray Smith
Nine Featurettes
Theatrical Trailer

MELANCHOLIA
Four Featurettes
Theatrical Trailer

NYMPHOMANIAC: VOLUME I & II - THE DIRECTOR'S CUT
Interviews with cast
Live Q&A with cast
Theatrical Trailers

THE HOUSE THAT JACK BUILT
Introduction by Lars von Trier
Featurette
Interview with Lars von Trier
Theatrical Trailer

[Aunt Peg]

Is the original BR that AE released of The House That Jack Built the same disc as in the boxset?

[swo17]

I would guess so (other than a cosmetic change to the disc itself). I don't have that original disc to compare but the menus look identical to the ones on DVD Beaver