Eight Deadly Shots. Mikko Niskanen deserves some international recognition/viewership.

As much as I love most Aki Kaurismäki films,Eight Deadly Shots is in the league of its own,the crowning achievment of Finnish cinema.The film was screened few weeks ago at Rotterdam film festival(five hour TV cut,the only right way to see this film) so maybe it got some recognition.I have a strong feeling that if this ever comes out on quality label(like Second Run for example!)with english subs, it'll surely be a major discovery for many film fans. .http://www.filmfestivalrotterdam.com/en ... manluotia/

Would love to see A Borrowed Life sometime.

Might be worth looking into Hou Hsiao-Hsien's first three films, there are no adequate English language editions and, because of their status as early impersonal studio films, are outside of the interest of larger companies, or Daughter of the Nile, which stands little chance of getting any significant attention as far as restoration is concerned.

I believe the early Edward Yang films (That Day on the Beach, Taipei Story) are Central Motion Pictures properties and likely candidates for their restoration & Blu-ray series but Mahjong and A Confucian Confusion desperately need attention.

Has Second Run ever worked from an NTSC source before? That could be a roadblock here.

I continue to hold out hope that someone like MoC will tackle the Taiwanese New Wave properly but that's just wishful thinking (as far as I know they've never shown any interest). Judging from the length of time it's taking for Criterion to release A Brighter Summer Day, it seems that there's rights issues with that title but I haven't heard any issues about any others.

Like you say, I can't imagine someone releasing Hsiao-Hsien's first three films, so they'd be great for Second Run to pick up. I'm not sure what's up with A Borrowed Life, no one seems interested in releasing it and there's hardly any discussion of the title, despite the praise it got at the time of release. I'd love Second Run to release it. There's also the work of Tsai Ming-Liang - looking at Amazon, it appears that only I Don't Want to Sleep Alone and The Wayward Cloud have had UK releases.

Perhaps it's time a new dvd company appeared specialising primarily in Asian cinema. I mean SecondRun do their bit but are largely focussed on Eastern Europe which still has many bounties to be unearthed. And MoC are spread around various different countries and eras and rely mainly on HD masters nowadays. BFI are spending more time on British cinema than other stuff, Arrow are more into horror and Italian cinema.

Does anybody think a Asian-focussed equivalent of Second Run would do as well or would they be even more stretched resource wise as I guess Eastern European cinema is going to be more well known and popular in Europe and America than Asian..?

I just feel that so many Asian classics are waiting to be released (from the Philippines, Taiwan, China, India, Iran especially...)

Let's hope that some lottery winner is reading this thread and decides to do just that! I don't think that a 'Second Run Asia' would do any worse than Second Run. Generally speaking, Asian cinema is much better known here than Eastern European cinema, even if a lot of it remains unreleased. I suppose it depends on how obscure the titles are - Yang, Hsiao-Hsien, Tsai, Kore-eda and Zhuangzhuang would probably sell relatively well. Going back further, you could probably sell decent amounts of Naruse and Oshima. Obscure titles would obviously do less well.

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Not sure if I've mentioned it before but I'd love Second Run to release Nikos Koundouros' O Drakos (known in English as The Dragon, The Ogre of Athens or The Fiend of Athens) which is practically the dictionary definition of 'forgotten masterpiece'. Recently, it was voted the best Greek film of all time by the Greek Film Critics Association and it's not hard to see why - it's a terrific film noir that follows the conventions of a Greek Tragedy and contains a very energetic element of satirical black comedy. The lighting is particularly masterful and if you didn't know better it could easily have been directed by Carol Reed or Orson Welles. Peter Bradshaw summed it up more eloquently than I could.

Being a relatively unknown film from Europe, it's right up Second Run's alley. There's an official site with a contact e-mail for "copyright and property commercial rights". Go on, give them an e-mail

I think if an Asia-centric label was able to acquire some significant name properties to drum up enthusiasm and build a base it really could be do-able. It would have to be a U.K. or European label where these licenses are still open, Criterion alone has too many potential starters wrapped up here in the states. An upstart that debuted with some of Mikio Naruse's 40s works or some Heinosuke Gosho, or the early Hou or Kiarostami films, would make themselves known to at least as many people as the Second Run audience. From there, the most obscure films, particularly modern day films, can start to come up.

Even among cinephiles countries like the Philippines are completely unknown frontier. As risky as Second Run's business model is, the countries that form their base were, however small, part of the critical landscape since the 1960s. Asian cinema beyond Japan has only opened up internationally in the last twenty years and has only really found strong attention since 2000. Now is the time to start getting this stuff out there but it's such an imposing project and few people know where to start and how to develop it at all.

What about a trilogy from a Dir. Miloš Zábranský

http://www.bontonland.cz/milos-zabransky/

Dům pro dva
Masseba
Stavení

We've not seen Zábranský's films, admira, so thanks for bringing it to our attention. We really respect your knowledge of Czech cinema... will order at least one of his films via your link and keep you informed if anything positive happens.

Not sure if Second Run would like to release it or not, but Vasili Sigarev's Volchok (Wolfy) from 2009, has not been picked up for an English language DVD release.

This film rang tragically true with me, a wonderful portrait of a child's loyal loving affection for a seemingly uncaring selfish mother.

Trailer

Trailer 2

Sorry for bringing these up again but... well here goes:

Proshu slova (I Wish To Speak), Gleb Panfilov, USSR 1975

One of the more extraordinary films I've seen - Gleb Panfilov's tale of a Soviet official (Inna Churikova) losing her grasp on life in the service of the State keeps modulating between apparent Socialist Realism, social satire and (although never actually going there) Tarkovskyan cinematic poetry.

Besides the wonderful cinematography - the long, static takes in the vast but claustrophobic office spaces in authentic 70's Sovcolor muted burgundy/brown/orange - the use of sound and music is especially striking: alternating with more upbeat moments (The Beatles, Soviet anthems - occasionally used to impose possible irony on otherwise banal scenes), an unplaceable rumbling/droning/ringing soundscape (quite reminiscent of Tarkovsky's ideas about electronic music in cinema) keeps persistently weaving in and out between the drawn-out images of bureaucratic tedium, lending the already ambivalent narrative with an ominous and pessimistic air (this film was still ambiguous enough to be sent to - and awarded at - Karlovy Vary, whereas Panfilov's next feature "Tema" was banned right off the bat). Great performances from all the actors - Vasily Shukshin also makes an appearance as a playwright struggling with censorship.

YouTube
http://glebpanfilov.ru/index/eng/filmography/fid/5

"salto" by tadeusz konwicki (1965). maybe it's too avant-garde, maybe it's too polish, maybe it's too "stagey" but still - omg what a masterpiece of a european/art-house cinema it is (and still virtually unknown outside poland). if you are already familiar with cybulski thanks to second run's "polish cinema classics" or "ashes and diamons" by wajda -this is his most poignant, electrifying performance on the screen.

famous "stuporous dance" scene

Thank you, all, for your pointers and suggestions. We do avidly read each post here... it's just that it is difficult to say anything more concrete than a simple acknowledgement. Some of the films we know and love and it reminds us to follow through on them (such as the wonderful SALTO), some we know and are following through already (such as the remarkable Ciulei film) and some we don't know and are keen to see first (such as the Panfilov and the Zábranský's).

We don't wish you to be disappointed if those films don't come through and so we've always felt it's better to wait until a film is confirmed before saying anything here.
But please know that we are always reading (and often learning from!) what you post here.

It's probably worth mentioning that Salto is out in Poland in two editions - an English-friendly one that's sourced from a horrendous VHS-quality master (it's one of the worst Polish DVD transfers I've seen, and that's saying something), and an unsubtitled copy based on the recent Studio Kadr restoration, which I assume is an unrecognisable improvement.

I'll have to echo these sentiments as well - even though it would properly be the duty of the Finns to put out a proper release of their own national masterpiece, it might prove difficult to market internationally without the support of a well-known label. A quick Googling produces little international interest in the film, but I wouldn't expect many to have even heard of it - however, the few comments from Rotterdam range from positive to enthusiastic, plus there's a very good appreciation at the Seattle Film Festival blog.

Considering that it's routinely name-checked as the masterpiece of Finnish cinema (amongst cinephiles that is - nation-wide polls will of course have you believe it's the first Unknown Soldier), endorsed by Kaurismäki and von Bagh, and that the existing Finnish DVD is beyond unwatchable (thus making a decent edition an instant purchase for all Finnish cinephiles), I don't think it's that far-out a suggestion.

repeat,this is not a pretty film visually so I actually like the "bad" pq of an existing dvd..I keep thinking about John Cassavetes every time I see this film.

Sure, it's 16mm and supposed to be rough and grainy, but I was referring to the excessive ghosting/filtering on the DVD that definitely does not belong to the material: it looks like it was done from some half-assed TV broadcast master. (For example, look at the arrest/fight scene in part 3: it looks almost like some crazy 80's video art in b&w!) I don't want to put anyone off from buying the only available version of this marvellous film (although I doubt anyone would want to do that anyway, as it has no subs), but it really is nearly the worst "transfer" of any film I've seen - and that fact alone cries out for a new release

The 2012 Venice Film Festival has programmed a selection of films from past festivals, none as yet restored or available in 35mm on DVD, but due to be restored by L´Immagine Ritrovata. IMHO two of them might be of interest to Second Run:

A Bagful of Fleas (Pytel blech) by Věra Chytilová Czechoslovakia, 1963, 44’, 35mm, black and white). The misery of everyday life, the existential void, the pompous didactic rhetoric of Communism inside a youth hostel. A documentary with ironic and grotesque moments, and one of the early works of Věra Chytilová, a key figure in the “nová ulna”, the new wave of Czechoslovakian film in the 1960’s. The only existing copy in the world.

Mud-covered City (Zablácené město) by Václav Táborský (Czechoslovakia, 1963, 8’, 35mm, black and white). In a new district under construction in Prague, mud is the citizens’ main concern: an ironic visual fantasy about the ambiguous – and sometimes absurd – urban and social development policies in Czechoslovakia in the Sixties.

Copies showing at Venice are taken from the Collections of the Historic Archives of the Contemporary Arts of the Biennale (ASAC). The selected films will undergo digital restoration at the L’Immagine Ritrovata lab in Bologna, or restored analogically with the purpose of obtaining a new 35mm copy. The Biennale will keep one 35mm or DCP/HD-cam copy of all the restored films, for preservation or future release in film circuits. Research was conducted by Stefano Francia di Celle under the supervision of Venice director Alberto Barbera.

Complete info here: http://www.screendaily.com/festivals/ve ... 91.article

Deleted. Double post. Sorry!

The 1983 Norwegian teen drama Apen Framtid, set in the late Sixties, would make a great Second Run DVD. I don't think it's ever been released in the UK, which is a shame. The whole film's on YouTube but without English subs.

Second Run have actually pursued this one, but the only available master is horrendous.

It's so bad that when I bought the Polart/Facets DVD, I actually ended up ripping the .vob files to see if there was any way I could improve the picture - but even after deinterlacing, detelecineing and a fair bit of other tweaking it still looked hideous. And I've never felt inclined to do that with a commercially released DVD before, which should give you some idea of just how bad it was.

So that one will definitely need a proper restoration before a release is viable.

Hopefully the Poles will get around to it at some point - they've really accelerated their restoration programmes in recent years, and this is one of the most important postwar Polish features. In fact, it's arguably the most important one between the end of WWII and the rise of Munk and Wajda in the mid-50s.

There's some Lithuanian films up on YouTube (many without English subs unfortunately) that I think would make a pretty good Second Run release. (I'll avoid linking to them directly but they're not hard to find)

Nobody Wanted to Die / Niekas nenorejo mirti
Feelings / Jausmai
Eternal Light / Amžinoji šviesa
Children from "Hotel America" / Vaikai iš Amerikos viešbučio

Awesome film.