25 Vampyr

[Tommaso]

Unbelievable. These guys really should get that flour mill treatment. Or become editors of Vogue.

[hellochas]

I saw this as well today, and kudos to the reviewer: Fredrik Strage (a journalist who more often than not leaves me baffled at some of the things he praises - in this clip he considers New Order's Technique album their best...) for highlighting this important release and offering himself as a contact person if potential buyers have problems sourcing the DVD. You can't say fairer than that!

Slightly improved subtitles (no criticism implied to you DignanSWE):

"Den känns lite långsam."
'It seems a bit plodding.'

"Orkar man se den här filmen? [....] Orkar man se en svartvit rulle?"
'Could one be bothered seeing this film? [...] Is it worth watching a black and white movie?'

"Lyfter filmen av det*?"
'Is the film better for it*?'

"Droppar man lite om den här franske killen Dreyer [på ett cafe]"
'A little name-dropping of this French guy Dreyer [at a cafe]'

*that Baron Nicolas de Gunzburg became an editor at Vogue

What a pair of planks those two hosts are!

[MichaelB]

That sounds even more toe-curling than Jeremy Paxman's Bergman obit - and that was bad enough!

[DignanSWE]

Fredrik Strage reviewed Artificial Eye's release of Les Vampires earlier this year (-- it was the same hosts... ):

"Du har något gammalt gammalt med dig..."
Host: 'You've brought something really really old with you...'

"Det är ganska fascinerande faktiskt att en thriller från 1915 fortfarande funkar."
"Har du något bevis på det?"
Strage: "It's pretty fascinating that a thriller from 1915 still works."
Host: "Do you have any proof?"

"Det här var inget fel, jag ska bara säga det till den moderna publiken. Det var en stumfilm."
Host: 'I have to tell the modern audience, this actually is supposed to be like this. It's a silent movie.'

"Det här är en riktig kriminalklassiker."
Strage: 'This is a classisc among crime movies.'
Host bursts into laughter.

"Men är det här för cineaster, folk som gillar skräckfilmshistoria eller bara super..."
"Om man gillar deckare så är det väldigt kul."
"Jaha, Morden i Midsomer eller......Les Vampires."
Host: 'So, is this for movie freaks, people who like horror movie history, or just super...'
Strage: 'It's really entertaining if you like crime movies.'
Host: "Well, Midsomer Murders or......Les Vampires."

"En del skådespelare som har jobbat på teatern har en tendens att titta rakt in i kameran också."
"Som en politiker."
Starge: 'Some actors who have worked in the theatre tend to look straight into the camera.'
Host: 'Like a politician.'
Host bursts into laughter.

"Stumfilmsskådespeleri anses ju ofta bättre än än ljudfilms[skådespeleri]."
Strage: 'Acting in silent movies is ofen considered better than acting in sound movies.'
Host bursts into laughter.

"Har du någonting med ljud, eller?"
Host: 'Do you have anything else, with sound, or...?'

[TheGodfather]

I watched the film with the del Toro commentary track today. Really liked it. Informative and humourous with a voice that`s pleasant to listen to.
Well recommended to listen to.

[Sheriff Chambers]

This doesn’t relate to MOC’s disc but thought this might be the place to mention the following.

The Barbican Centre in London is running another of its Silent Film and Live Music seasons, 20 September to 13 December, and includes a screening of Vampyr on Sunday 18 October, 4pm, with live accompaniment by HarmonieBand - Vampires and Phantoms in Silent Film – Part I.

Vampyr is a sound film, not a silent film – however unusual its approach to sound/dialogue may seem to some contemporary audiences. And why would anyone think it necessary to do away with Wolfgang Zeller’s score? Does anyone know what’s going on here?

http://www.barbican.org.uk/film/series.asp?id=263" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Matt]

Kristin Thompson has a very nice appreciation of Del Toro's commentary.

[neilist]

'Vampyr' is getting a bit of a run in UK cinemas next year, courtesy of a new soundtrack from former Siouxsie and The Banshees member Steven Severin, although his Facebook page says they'll just showing a DVD of the film rather than a print.

picturehouses.co.uk has some details and the complete list of showings is up.

Sad it's not on at the Cambridge Picturehouse, but I guess it was shown at the film festival there with another live soundtrack a few years ago. I remember it being well attended though, you'd think they'd give this one a go, but then again I think I'd prefer to just see it with the original soundtrack anyway.

[zedz]

Oh dear, another instance of that unfortunate phenomenon of people assuming that any film that's old and black-and-white is a 'silent'. Somebody should politely point out that there are thousands of actually soundtrack-less films ready and waiting for creative accompaniment.

[matrixschmatrix]

Where does it say anyone thinks it's a silent? Beauty and the Beast got an alternate soundtrack, and I don't think anyone ever thought that about it.

[zedz]

Well, duh. My point is that the integrity of the original film should be respected. Stripping off the soundtrack is a worse violation of that integrity than colorization would be.

[matrixschmatrix]

I don't see where using the visuals of an existing movie to create a new work is in any way a violation. The original soundtrack is still there.

[mfunk9786]

Zedz and I don't agree on a lot, but fuck this noise

[neilist]

He also appears to have similarly toured performing a soundtrack to Cocteau's 'Le Sang d'un Poète', so seemingly has a thing for overwriting the audio of early sound films.

[zedz]

Zedz and I don't agree on a lot, but fuck this noise

(attempts to high-five mfunk, misses, slips, and breaks nose)

[HerrSchreck]

. . . I mean what's next. . removing the image track of, say, M and replacing it with newly shot footage --yet since the audio track is maintained in tact calling this bastard child M?

I dare say that with afilm like Vampyr, with ( via such minimal dialogue) the soundtrack playing such a critical role in the overall chemistry of the title, removing the audio track to insert your own contemporary score, is a professional grandstanding of the ballsiest type.

Why not extensively edit the texts of Shakespeare and Chaucer and nonetheless release them under their original titles?

Happy holidays to all my old pals here ! you know who you are..

[knives]

Why not extensively edit the texts of Shakespeare and Chaucer and nonetheless release them under their original titles?

[Tommaso]

Rouben Mamoulian did precisely that with "Hamlet". Seems the man worked several years on it in the 60s. That's what you do when you're not allowed to make films anymore.

[Michael Kerpan]

Why not extensively edit the texts of Shakespeare and Chaucer and nonetheless release them under their original titles?

If you read Shaw's drama criticism from the 1890s, producing radically altered Shakespeare plays -- and presenting them as the real thing was still the norm in London. Presenting Shakespeare in unadapted (even if somewhat shortened) form was a novelty then.

[matrixschmatrix]

Most productions of Shakespeare plays feature dramatically shortened texts, and sometimes additional material from other texts.

[MichaelB]

Richard III is only worth performing uncut if it's programmed as part four of a complete Henry VI/Richard III cycle - otherwise, there's far too much stuff that will be incomprehensible if you haven't seen the three preceding plays.

Which is why many standalone adaptations cut anything up to half the original text.

[HerrSchreck]

Sure.. as you can alll probably well imagine, I'm very much aware of the phenomenon of editing play text for stage presentation. . . perhaps owing to this reason my example was not the best one... but what I was talking about was a complete hypothetical or imaginary 100% replacement of the text ( the way in the Dreyer example the audio track is completely replaced) with brand new text in a strictly literary presentation, and rendered under the name of William Shakespeare.

[matrixschmatrix]

I think productions of Shakespeare are a germane example, though. This is not a new print or release of Vampyr in which the soundtrack has been replaced, claiming to be definitive or authoritative- it is a series of specific live performances in which elements of Vampyr have been altered. That seems much more comparable to a specific production of a play than it would be to an altered printing of the text, to me.

[mfunk9786]

The original soundtrack isn't written in a jaunty outdated centuries-old vernacular

[evillights]

The original soundtrack isn't written in a jaunty outdated centuries-old vernacular

?