Against
The Storm (1938 -
1942/Flicker Alley Blu-ray)/All
That Breathes
(2022*)/Orlando: My
Political Biography
(2023/*both Criterion/Janus Contemporary Blu-rays)
Picture:
B/B-/B- Sound: B-/B-/B Extras: B-/C/C Films: B/B-/B-
Now
for a new set of documentary releases...
Against
The Storm (1938 - 1942)
features the remarkable documentary work of Herbert Klein, who
pretended (at great risk with his assistant) to be a Nazi sympathizer
to film something people were not widely aware of, the Nazi invasion
of Europe. He was only in his twenties when he did this and it
became the first of many and many very important documents of what
resulted in the permanent, priceless, incredible, remarkable and
impossible to overly praise works that are even more valuable now
than ever.
Crisis:
A Film Of ''The Nazi Way''
was the original result, issued in 1938, then the duo went to Warsaw,
Poland and England for a follow-up and
Lights
Out in Europe
(1940) was the amazing result. They set the high standards for which
all other such films that followed met and they have been restored
very nicely here, sometimes with vivid images that brings back the
impact of how bad this all
was. These are must see films and cheers to Flicker Alley, The
Museum of Modern Art, Sunset Foundation and National Center for
Jewish Film for re-protecting and restoring some of the most
important documentary films ever made.
Extras
include:
Audio
Commentary for Crisis by cultural historian Thomas Doherty
Audio
Commentary for Lights Out in Europe by film historian Maria
Elena de las Carreras
Peace!
The Four Power Conference (1938) - A Pathe Gazette
newsreel
The
White Eagle (1942) - Directed by Eugeniusz Cekalski, this
Academy Award-nominated documentary short
Image
Gallery
and
another high quality Souvenir Booklet - A new essay by Thomas
Doherty & Conservation notes by Dave Kehr.
Shaunak
Sen's All That Breathes
(2022) is a look at how two brothers in New Delhi are going out of
their way to save various birds of prey from pollution, high human
population, industrialization and even each other in a
compelling-enough 98 minutes of this real life story about how two
men make a huge difference in the lives of people and these animals.
They really care and Sen really captures that, which is why it has
been received so well.
Now
whether that is your kind of documentary is another story and the
text on the case tries to say it 'reinvents' the environmental
documentary' but I would argue it does not need to, does not and this
cycle has been strong for many years, especially when most of the
mainstream news is not going far enough (thanks to big oil companies
or the like? Hmm?) and really just adds to the canon of such motion
picture texts worldwide. For me, once was enough, but it is not easy
to dis miss and I'm glad it got made and got what has to be an
unexpectedly larger reception than any independent release gets these
days.
Extras
include a paper with an essay by Michael Joshua Rowin, while the disc
adds...
• Meet the Filmmaker, a new interview with director
Shaunak Sen
• and
an Original Theatrical Trailer.
Finally,
we have Paul B.
Preciado's Orlando:
My Political Biography
(2023) deals with how the character (Tilda Swinton played the title
character in a feature film not too long ago) has become an icon for
gay and transgender persons looking for acceptance, meaning,
identity, life, living, comfort, a future and connection through
Virginia Woolf's enduring character.
The
result is a compilation, pastiche and even deep study on how the
character and what the character represents for so many, including
freedom and the chance to develop an individuality not solely based
on a fixed sexuality. The result Preciado paints a portrait of a
unique kind of character study that has touched lives that deserves
to have more love and life. It is also about the real politik of
human sexuality today, how regressive hate-mongering and regressive
politics (among other things) have unnecessarily ruined lives and
created a situation where really, some fine people who never harmed
anyone are being used as a test ground to go after all kinds of
people for no good reason except cheap political gain and worse.
Skipping
that, we get to see some nice, fine people finding new ways to think
and feel and that is a triumph in itself. Glad I saw this one too.
Extras
include a paper with an essay by Michael Joshua Rowin, while the disc
adds...
• Meet the Filmmaker, a new interview with director Paul
B. Preciado
• and
an Original Theatrical Trailer.
Now
for playback performance. The 1080p 1.33 X 1 black &
white digital High Definition image transfers on the Strong
Blu-ray can show the age of the materials used, but this is far
superior a transfer to all previous releases of these films on home
video, while all the monophonic sound here is presented in PCM 2.0
Mono. Despite some roughness in small parts as expected, this looks
really good and I was glad to see it looking so.
The
1080p 1.85 X 1 digital High Definition image on Breathes
is an HD shoot and has some softness and even color limits, but is
consistent and fine as intended. The 1080p 1.78 X 1 digital High
Definition image on Orlando
is also an HD shoot and goes for more color to its advantage, but is
also a little soft throughout just the same. Both offer DTS-HD
MA (Master Audio) 5.1 lossless sound mixes and the Hindi on
Breathes
is fine but quiet, while the French on Orlando
is more active and surprisingly lively, making it the sonically best
release here.
-
Nicholas Sheffo
