Karel Kachyňa’s darkly satirical, long-suppressed political-noir, is available for the first time anywhere on Blu-ray, and presented from a new HD transfer.
A high-ranking Communist official and his wife begin to suspect that their home has been put under surveillance by the Party. Over one night, the growing tension exposes a bitter fault-line in their relationship, feeding an atmosphere of paranoia and dread.
Daring to address the taboos of the Stalinist era, The Ear was banned soon after completion and remained unseen until the fall of Communism twenty years later. Combining a blackly-comic portrait of a disintegrating marriage with a searing critique of totalitarianism, this landmark film is an extraordinary indictment of life under an oppressive system and remains starkly relevant today.
Our region-free Blu-ray Special Edition also features a filmed introduction to the film by author Peter Hames and also includes Vlastimil Venclík’s banned 1969 short The Uninvited Guest (Nezvaný host), an original Projection Booth commentary recorded especially for this release with Mike White, Ben Buckingham and Martin Kessler, and 20-page booklet featuring writing on the film by Peter Hames, producer Steven Schneider and journalist Graham Williamson.
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Supplements
- A filmed introduction to the film by writer and critic Peter Hames
- The Projection Booth commentary with Mike White, Ben Buckingham and Martin Kessler
- The Uninvited Guest (Nezvaný host, 1969): a short film by Vlastimil Venclík
- Booklet featuring writing on the film by Peter Hames, author and producer Steven Jay Schneider and journalist and critic Graham Williamson