56-57 Bandits of Orgosolo + The Lost World

[Finch]

Bandits of Orgosolo + The Lost World

A Sardinian peasant is suspected of murder following an encounter with bandits. In order to survive, he has no option but to turn to banditry himself. Winning multiple awards at the Venice Film Festival, Bandits of Orgosolo continues the traditions of Visconti and De Sica yet with his own style and rhythms Vittorio De Seta musters just as much power as the earlier masters. This release includes De Seta’s remarkable short film programme ‘The Lost World’ comprising his Cannes Film Festival award-winning short film Islands of Fire and others which survey Italy’s poorest communities. Despite awards and plaudits on release these incredible films only now make their English language debut on home video. Upon release, Bandits moved Martin Scorsese to observe: “It was as if De Seta were an anthropologist who spoke with the voice of a poet.”

LIMITED EDITION BLU-RAY SPECIAL FEATURES:

Disc 1: New 4K restoration from the original camera negative by The Film Foundation and Cineteca di Bologna at L’Immagine Ritrovata laboratory, in association with Titanus with funding provided by the Hobson/Lucas Family Foundation
New interview with cinematographer Luciano Tovoli (2024, 28 mins)
New interview with curator and filmmaker Ehsan Khoshbakht (2024, 11 mins)
Disc 2: The Lost World: A programme of ten restored short films by De Seta, featuring Islands of Fire (1954, 11 mins), The Age of the Swordfish (1954, 11 mins), Golden Parable (1955, 10 mins), Sea Countrymen (1955, 11 mins), Solfatara (1955, 11 mins), Easter in Sicily (1955, 10 mins), Orgosolo’s Shepherds (1958, 11 mins), Fishing Boats (1959, 11 mins), A Day in Barbagia (1958, 11 mins), The Forgotten (1959, 21 mins), restored by Fondazione Cineteca di Bologna at L’Immagine Ritrovata laboratory and The Film Foundation, with funding provided by the George Lucas Family Foundation.
Archival interview with Vittorio De Seta (2008, 18 mins)
New interview with curator and filmmaker Ehsan Khoshbakht (2024, 21 mins)
Trailer
Optional English subtitles
Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Filippo Di Battista
Limited edition booklet featuring new writing by Roberto Curti
Limited Edition of 3000 copies, presented in full-height Scanavo packaging with removable OBI strip leaving packaging free of certificates and markings

[TMDaines]

So exicted for this one. Great when you see a title, think that is right up another label's alley, and then are rewarded in only a few months' time!

Worth pointing out that the disc with the shorts is exclusive to the UK, and the US release will not contain it.

[domino harvey]

This is one of those world cinema hits that was huge at the time and then never really cemented into the canon. I must confess I wasn’t too impressed when I watched it recently, but I think many here will enjoy it

[Red Screamer]

I found it to be effective as something of a rural noir and thought the restoration had potential to look great on blu when I saw it theatrically. Looking forward to the Khoshbakht interviews especially.

[Jean-Luc Garbo]

The disc of shorts already makes this release of the year top ten for me. I was very impressed when I watched them on the Criterion Channel and had never heard of De Seta before. A big reason why I love these Film Foundation restorations so much too.

[Glowingwabbit]

Bummed that the US edition won't have the shorts. As a US subscriber I might have to double dip on this.

[What A Disgrace]

I think the first half of 2024 is better than the at-the-time utterly brilliant first half of 2023 for Radiance, and this release certainly looks to be one of their very best releases.

[swo17]

Worth pointing out that the disc with the shorts is exclusive to the UK, and the US release will not contain it.

Is this the first time Radiance has done this?

[rapta]

As Fran has explained elsewhere, the US rights for the shorts are with Criterion, hence why the US release is only the feature film disc.

It's the first time they've had to remove a disc, but technically they could only release one of three features that were part of their World Noir Vol. 1 set, so they've been blocked from releasing discs before. Silver lining is that the UK release of this is Region Free, so those who want the shorts on disc can always import (I can't imagine Criterion will do anything with them - unless they release a different De Seta film and include them, I suppose).

[Matt]

Radiance confirmed on Twitter/X that both discs in the set are region-free

[ryannichols7]

the only pain point here I could see is if you're a US subscriber and you're getting the edition without the shorts, when you can readily pick up the region free edition from Orbit/Diabolik/etc. gonna be interesting to see

either way this is a brilliant release, I've had my eyes on these for awhile (especially after working through a good bit of Italian movies) and am glad to see more Italian movies that aren't just genre stuff (though I will be trying Cosa Nostra and Tony Arzenta), as I enjoyed The Sunday Woman and look forward to Misunderstood. as said above, I can't imagine Criterion doing much with this, or at least at the price Radiance is