The Addiction

Discuss releases from Arrow and the films on them.

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domino harvey
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Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2006 2:42 pm

The Addiction

#1 Post by domino harvey » Thu Mar 29, 2018 10:27 am

Image

The mid-nineties were a fertile period for the vampire movie. Big-name stars such as Tom Cruise and Eddie Murphy flocked to genre, as did high-calibre filmmakers like Francis Ford Coppola, veterans Wes Craven and John Landis, independents Michael Almereyda and Jeffrey Arsenault, and up-and-comers Quentin Tarantino and Guillermo del Toro. Amid the fangs and crucifixes, Abel Ferrara reunited with his King of New York star Christopher Walken for The Addiction, a distinctly personal take on creatures of the night.

Philosophy student Kathleen (Lili Taylor, The Conjuring) is dragged into an alleyway on her way home from class by Casanova (Annabella Sciorra, The Hand That Rocks the Cradle) and bitten on the neck. She quickly falls ill but realises this isn t any ordinary disease when she develops an aversion to daylight and a thirst for human blood...

Having made a big-budget foray into science fiction two years earlier with Body Snatchers, Ferrara s approach to the vampire movie is in a lower key. Shot on the streets of New York, like so many of his major works including The Driller Killer, Ms. 45 and Bad Lieutenant - and beautifully filmed in black and white, The Addiction sees the filmmaker on his own terms and at his very best: raw, shocking, intense, intelligent, masterful.

DIRECTOR-APPROVED SPECIAL EDITION CONTENTS

New restoration from a 4K scan of the original camera negative by Arrow Films, approved by director Abel Ferrara and director of photography Ken Kelsch
High Definition (1080p) Blu-ray presentation
Restored 5.1 audio
Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
Audio commentary by Abel Ferrara, moderated by critic and biographer Brad Stevens
Talking with the Vampires (2018) A new documentary about the film made by Ferrara especially for this release, featuring actors Christopher Walken and Lili Taylor, composer Joe Delia, Ken Kelsch, and Ferrara himself
New interview with Abel Ferrara
New interview with Brad Stevens
Abel Ferrara Edits The Addiction, an archival piece from the time of production
Original trailer
Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Peter Strain
FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Illustrated collector s booklet containing new writing on the film by critic Michael Ewins

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JSC
Joined: Thu May 16, 2013 9:17 am

Re: The Addiction

#2 Post by JSC » Thu Mar 29, 2018 10:28 am

At last I finally retire my twenty-year old VHS of this!

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swo17
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Re: The Addiction

#3 Post by swo17 » Thu Mar 29, 2018 10:38 am

That's nine name checks in the opening paragraph for people that have absolutely nothing to do with this movie.

Calvin
Joined: Sun Apr 10, 2011 11:12 am

Re: The Addiction

#4 Post by Calvin » Thu Mar 29, 2018 11:05 am

I wonder what this "world premiere of the director's cut" that's taking place in Newcastle in a couple of days is about then, as there's nothing in those Arrow specs to suggest it's anything other than the cut we're familiar with?

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gcgiles1dollarbin
Joined: Sun Sep 19, 2010 3:38 am

Re: The Addiction

#5 Post by gcgiles1dollarbin » Thu Mar 29, 2018 1:50 pm

Lili Taylor is so good in this. Probably my favorite Ferrara film. It's a great companion piece to Almereyda's Nadja, the other black and white vampire film of this period (albeit not shot on a PXL-2000, during a vogue for this toy camera's murky look). I prefer both to Coppola's baroque novel adaptation; not a popular preference on this board, I'm guessing. Come to think of it, with Merhige's Begotten, Tsukamoto's Tetsuo, and Belvaux, Bonzel, and Poelvoorde's C'est arrivé près de chez vous, this period was quite a season for beautifully disturbing, black & white, shoe-string horror films.

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Finch
Joined: Mon Jul 07, 2008 5:09 pm
Location: Edinburgh, UK

Re: The Addiction

#6 Post by Finch » Thu Mar 29, 2018 4:31 pm

So stoked for this. AV's most exciting announcement of the year yet.

M Sanderson
Joined: Sat Oct 22, 2016 3:43 am

Re: The Addiction

#7 Post by M Sanderson » Fri Mar 30, 2018 3:27 am

swo17 wrote:That's nine name checks in the opening paragraph for people that have absolutely nothing to do with this movie.
Good point, I does take a while for them to get to the point. The Addiction is so distinctive that the name checks you mention are not necessary.

Hope The Funeral is also one the way!

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colinr0380
Joined: Mon Nov 08, 2004 4:30 pm
Location: Chapel-en-le-Frith, Derbyshire, UK

Re: The Addiction

#8 Post by colinr0380 » Thu Jun 21, 2018 5:58 pm

Mondo Digital review, though the one thing they do not mention is that The Addiction was not the only black-and-white arty-noodly meditation on the philosophical ennui at the heart of being a modern vampire, as Nadja was released the same year. Both films would make a good double bill!

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Adam X
Joined: Thu Apr 16, 2009 5:04 am

Re: The Addiction

#9 Post by Adam X » Fri Jun 22, 2018 9:04 am

The latter would also make for a good release from Arrow etc. Both fairly different approaches to a vampire film, both really good & enjoyable too. Why not add Only Lovers Left Alive and make it a great indie triple bill.

M Sanderson
Joined: Sat Oct 22, 2016 3:43 am

Re: The Addiction

#10 Post by M Sanderson » Sat Jun 23, 2018 3:30 am

I can’t wait to rediscover this art/horror masterpiece. It has some of the most beautifully stark bw photography in a modern film. And one of the best hip hop soundtracks. Taylor is haunting, Walken beguiling. Ferrara, Kelsch & St John in apparently perfect harmony.

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colinr0380
Joined: Mon Nov 08, 2004 4:30 pm
Location: Chapel-en-le-Frith, Derbyshire, UK

Re: The Addiction

#11 Post by colinr0380 » Sat Jun 23, 2018 3:38 am

The other great link between The Addiction and Nadja is that Lili Taylor starred as Valerie Solanas in I Shot Andy Warhol the next year (she was on a roll at that time!) and Jared Harris, who was in Nadja, plays Warhol!

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dadaistnun
Joined: Thu Nov 04, 2004 8:31 am

Re: The Addiction

#12 Post by dadaistnun » Wed Aug 08, 2018 11:48 am

I just watched this - my first and heretofore only viewing was when it came out on VHS. (My local art house didn't play it, sadly.) My memory of it largely revolved around Sciorra's first scene and the doctoral celebration - both still highlights, but my god what a film this is. Distressing, darkly funny, beautifully photographed, killer score, and a perhaps never better Lili Taylor. I've always loved her (how can you not?), but she is phenomenal in this. All this and a tight 82 minute running time. Great work from Arrow and all involved on this release.

One little touch I especially loved:
SpoilerShow
During the climatic bloodbath, Sciorra moves in on a victim and keeps her glass of wine in hand the entire time. It's like she's been a vampire long enough that she is able to gracefully multitask!

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W0rldofsound
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Re: The Addiction

#13 Post by W0rldofsound » Thu Jan 03, 2019 6:30 pm

Can't believe this out of a booklet already

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therewillbeblus
Joined: Tue Dec 22, 2015 3:40 pm

Re: The Addiction

#14 Post by therewillbeblus » Tue Jun 14, 2022 1:40 am

I may need to re-evaluate my feelings on Ferrara, as this is an out-and-out masterpiece, and a perfect complementary film to Ferrara's incredible recent Tommaso. While that film gave us a messy picture of what life in recovery is like, The Addiction displays a similarly convoluted portrait of the active addict's objective existence and internal psychological processes. Ferrara's fearlessness and wit are measured with surprisingly allegorical and stylistic restraint- don't get me wrong, this is a very aesthetically pleasing film, with many thematic merit to glean, but the film resists the easy pitfall to be didactic or obvious about what it's doing. Lili Taylor gives a courageous performance that gets so much right about the dirty living of the addict: deluding the moral accountability of her actions through blaming her victims with inflicting sincerity, intellectualizing her way into nihilistic self-pity, posturing at intangible religious and philosophical constructs for elusive aid, trying to and believing she can control her disease alone, and then confronting the deep-rooted disbelief under that gown, weighed down further by the isolated existence she's forged without the necessary support to dig out.

Like the best films about addiction, this is also about more than that- in this instance, the developmental stage of emerging adulthood. More specifically, this film targets the experience of youth inhabiting urban social contexts as the novelty of the transition to living independently has worn off, and they begin to engage in the rote, banal aspects of adult life on life's terms without the dopamine rush of ubiquitous exhilarating meaning promised by systems of higher ed, media, their hopes and dreams, and the intrinsic desires of their brain chemistry to achieve stimulation. In many ways, this is like Last Night in Soho only with an addiction subtext instead of gender oppression latched onto that meditation on a universal phase of existential sobriety.

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