113 Three Wishes for Cinderella

[Bikey]

"It's a real charmer... makes this endearing fairytale all the more timeless even as its underlying politics and the irresistible Šafránková give it a decidedly modern slant."

A 4-star review from Ben Nicholson at CineVue

[DogEyedBoy]

Does Three Wishes for Cinderella suffer from PAL speedup or was it filmed at 25fps?

[Bikey]

Yes, any PAL DVD edition of THREE WISHES FOR CINDERELLA release running is affected by PAL speedup.
The film was originally shot on 35mm, 24fps.

[Bikey]

"It's one of the finest and most creative dramatizations of the fairy tale... this is a very clear and sparkling presentation that makes a fine way to make the film's acquaintance."

Mondo Digital

[Bikey]

From Monday December 19 THREE WISHES FOR CINDERELLA will be available to watch for 30 days only on MUBI UK

[Bikey]

THREE WISHES FOR CINDERELLA - Special Christmas screening this Friday 23rd December, 6:30m at ICA Cinema

[Bikey]

"Second Run have really exceeded expectations on this package; it truly is a beautiful set"
says Kat Ellinger at Diabolique Magazine

[Bikey]

Post-Christmas treat - screening TONIGHT at Close Up Film Centre, 7pm

[GaryC]

In the 1970s, this was shown on BBC 1's 'Tales from Europe', in 3 or 4 installments, with Gabriel Wolf's(?) narration laid over the original dialogue,
which was still audible in the background.

It took me a while to find it on BBC Genome, because the BBC called it Three Gifts for Cinderella. It was indeed Gabriel Woolf narrating. First showing February-March 1975.

[Bikey]

"In this high-definition 4K restoration, the film looks fresh and detailed and ready to be enjoyed at many festive firesides to come. This edition also includes a vastly well-informed video appreciation by Michael Brooke and a similarly detailed essay by Tim Lucas."

A fabulous full-page appreciation by Pamela Hutchinson in the latest Sight & Sound magazine

[What A Disgrace]

Blu-ray upgrade in December.

• Three Wishes for Cinderella (Tři oříšky pro Popelku, 1973) presented from a 4K restoration by the Czech National Film Archive.
• An expansive filmed appreciation by writer, producer and Czechoslovak cinema specialist Michael Brooke.
• Cinderella (Popelka, 1929): An early Czech silent film version of the classic tale directed by Josef Kokeisl.
• The Little Shoe (Střevíček, 1937): A short animated Czech film by Jiří Fridrich.
• Trailers.
• Booklet featuring an essay by author, film critic and historian Tim Lucas.
• New and improved English subtitle translation.
• UK premiere on Blu-ray.
• Region free Blu-ray (A/B/C).

[TechnicolorAcid]

Finally, been dying to see this one on Blu-Ray and I hope that if this sells well more Václav Vorlíček titles will be available.

[ryannichols7]

nice!!! very thrilled we're getting this at last. Criterion weirdly push it on the channel (will they release it on disc? hard to say) so I had an inkling Second Run would get to it at some point. very thrilled to see the shorts and MichaelB on there

my next most wanted Czech BD upgrade would be Pictures of the Old World. my most wanted overall DVD->BD upgrade from Second Run would be Szindbad. hopefully we see both in 2025

[MichaelB]

For the record, this won't be the same piece that came out on the DVD eight years ago - I've upgraded all the clips, stills and captions to HD (with the latter, sadly, I had to add a fair number of death dates), and I've also corrected a mistake in the original where, in comparing the Czech and German versions, I inadvertently featured the Schweizerdeutsch soundtrack instead of the normal German one. A subtitling flub on one of the clips has also been fixed.

I'm also hoping to reshoot my on-camera contribution in its entirety to rather better technical (and, frankly, delivery) standards than it had back then - but even if I run out of time for that, it'll still be a noticeable improvement.

I was rather pleasantly surprised when I rewatched it yesterday for the first time in eight years - it needed some tweaking (which it's had), but I recalled it being just 5-10 minutes, not more than half an hour.

[ryannichols7]

For the record, this won't be the same piece that came out on the DVD eight years ago - I've upgraded all the clips, stills and captions to HD (with the latter, sadly, I had to add a fair number of death dates), and I've also corrected a mistake in the original where, in comparing the Czech and German versions, I inadvertently featured the Schweizerdeutsch soundtrack instead of the normal German one. A subtitling flub on one of the clips has also been fixed.

I'm also hoping to reshoot my on-camera contribution in its entirety to rather better technical (and, frankly, delivery) standards than it had back then - but even if I run out of time for that, it'll still be a noticeable improvement.

I was rather pleasantly surprised when I rewatched it yesterday for the first time in eight years - it needed some tweaking (which it's had), but I recalled it being just 5-10 minutes, not more than half an hour.

when I made my initial post I hadn't realized you were on the DVD (I never owned it, in hopes of an incoming BD) but that's terrific to hear actually! I usually don't have a problem with DVD extras being dumped onto BDs in SD but that's great attention to detail

[TMDaines]

The Czech disc has always been out of stock when I have made a Klapka order in recent years, so actually happy to see this be released here too.

[MichaelB]

I'm delighted to be able to confirm that I did indeed manage to completely refilm my contribution from scratch, and that version 2.0 is a whopping improvement for more reasons than just the HD boost - although that in itself makes a big difference.

It's at least 95% identical in terms of verbal content (I was surprisingly happy with the script when I dug it out), but for various logistical reasons - not least what I recall being a horrendously uncomfortable shoot physically - the delivery was woeful in the original; I blitzed through it much too quickly because I just wanted it to be over. Tellingly, despite what I reckon is well under a minute of actual new material (essentially, acknowledging Libuše Šafránková's recent death plus the fact that the Norwegians are such big fans of the film that they remade it themselves in 2021), the running time of the new version is a full seven minutes longer, and that's only partially because the clips are now running at theatrical speed!

Another very pleasant change is the sheer number of Second Run covers - the whistle-stop Czechoslovak New Wave title montage at the start now features more titles (which really underscores what a phenomenal job Second Run has done in that particular area), the three-panel presentation of František Vláčil's three medieval films is now stylistically congruent (previously, I'd had to use the Czech DVD cover of The Devil's Trap), and so on.

[Bikey]

I'm delighted to be able to confirm that I did indeed manage to completely refilm my contribution from scratch, and that version 2.0 is a whopping improvement for more reasons than just the HD boost - although that in itself makes a big difference.

It's at least 95% identical in terms of verbal content (I was surprisingly happy with the script when I dug it out), but for various logistical reasons - not least what I recall being a horrendously uncomfortable shoot physically - the delivery was woeful in the original; I blitzed through it much too quickly because I just wanted it to be over. Tellingly, despite what I reckon is well under a minute of actual new material (essentially, acknowledging Libuše Šafránková's recent death plus the fact that the Norwegians are such big fans of the film that they remade it themselves in 2021), the running time of the new version is a full seven minutes longer, and that's only partially because the clips are now running at theatrical speed!

Another very pleasant change is the sheer number of Second Run covers - the whistle-stop Czechoslovak New Wave title montage at the start now features more titles (which really underscores what a phenomenal job Second Run has done in that particular area), the three-panel presentation of František Vláčil's three medieval films is now stylistically congruent (previously, I'd had to use the Czech DVD cover of The Devil's Trap), and so on.

Thank you very much, MichaelB. Once again you've helped us way beyond the call of duty...

[Peacock]

And it's such a visually sumptuous film, is there any likelihood of a UK BD release?

None whatsoever: I've already asked them directly.

And their reasoning is perfectly sound: while the film may have a humungous cult following in its two countries of origin (and elsewhere in Europe; it's big in Norway as well), it's almost entirely unknown in the UK, and it's also not the kind of film that appeals overmuch to film buffs. So a British BD would be a substantial commercial risk in a way that it clearly wouldn't be in Germany or the Czech Republic.

I’m happy they changed their mind! I wonder what changed market wise for them?

[TechnicolorAcid]

Maybe the success of Deaf Crocodile’s Czech titles convinced them to take a risk on a more fantasy oriented film. Though that possibility doesn’t seem the most likely.

[What A Disgrace]

I would think that the performance of the likes of their own Beauty and the Beast, The Cassandra Cat, the Zeman films and others would be a likely factor.

[MichaelB]

Yes, it's worth recalling that it was something of an outlier in their catalogue back in 2016 - frankly, they had no idea how well it would perform, and because they'd literally just adopted the Blu-ray format they thought it was too big a commercial risk. Basically, the same kind of decisions that are being taken right now with regard to UHD titles, and for very similar reasons.

[ermylaw]

I'm very excited for the blu-ray release. I discovered this film a few years back, and it's one that has entered my "films to watch every year" rotation. It's the very definition of delightful!

[MichaelB]

As I say in my piece, one of the most refreshing things about it is that because it's one of the few really prominent Cinderella films that isn't based on the Charles Perrault version - so there's no fairy godmother, pumpkin or midnight curfew - you can't anticipate what's going to happen in the same way that you can with most fairytale adaptations if you didn't grow up favouring the central European versions (i.e. the Brothers Grimm and Božena Němcová).

And the other thing that this film really emphasises is how infuriatingly passive Cinderella usually is, with next to no agency of her own - she's bullied by her sisters and although helped by her fairy godmother, there are strict terms and conditions attached, as well as an unbreakable deadline. Here, by contrast, we have someone who's not afraid to answer back (regardless of whether it's to a bullying stepmother/older sister or even a prince), and who doesn't indulge in idle romantic fantasy - rather splendidly, while everyone else is fawning and grovelling over the impending royal visit, Popelka (as I call her to distinguish her from the western Cinderella model) is using it as cover for what she really wants to do, which is to sneak out and ride her favourite horse while nobody's looking. Jack Zipes' book The Enchanted Screen has a whole chapter on Cinderella adaptations, and he's firmly of the opinion that this is one of the best, along with Tex Avery's equally subversive Swing Shift Cinderella.

(Although in terms of Czech culture it's really not that subversive - women in Czech fairytales have always been rather feistier than their western counterparts, almost certainly a reflection of Božena Němcová's massive influence on Czech literature as a whole.)

[TechnicolorAcid]

I think subverting the traditional expectations of certain stories is a theme present in Vorlicek’s other works too with the comic book mischief of Who Wants to Kill Jessie? and especially his subversion of Czech folk creatures with How to Drown Dr. Mracek, the Lawyer through his humanizing of the water sprites.