Katyn (Wajda, 2007)

[MichaelB]

...is out on DVD in Poland on February 21 - with English subtitles.

It's available in single or double-disc editions, though I don't yet know if the deluxe set is any use to non-Polish speakers.

[posto]

Michael,
can you post a link to a source of your information.
I found this (in polish only). But they clearly state polish subtitles only (Napisy: polskie).
I'll buy special edition right away, but I was unable to find any info about it.
Besides this being Wajda's movie I have read extensively on a topic of Katyn massacre recently.
BTW there is a short documentary sequence from Katyn forest in Sweet Movie.

[MichaelB]

Well, Merlin claims it has English subtitles - but I'm looking for corroboration.

[pro-bassoonist]

Well, Merlin claims it has English subtitles - but I'm looking for corroboration.

I posted here on January 21 that the disc is indeed English friendly. I am attaching the cover I posted at TALK as well.

Pro-B

[MichaelB]

I'm more dubious now - Merlin seems to be the exception. The other retailers I've checked say that it's Polish only.

A friend of mine is visiting her native Poland at the end of the month, and she says she'll check the box and buy it if it has English subtitles. Given the uncertainty, this sounds like the best bet!

A promising development: the number of retailers claiming English subtitles has increased significantly in the last few days - and none of the ones that don't mention subtitles explicitly say "Napisy: brak" (Subtitles: none)...

[tavernier]

Hell, here's hoping the damn movie wins the Best Foreign Film Oscar so we will then get an R1 release at some point!

[MichaelB]

Well, I've gambled and ordered it - if I'm wrong, my Polish friend gets a freebie.

Hopefully it'll turn up next week or just after, and I'll post as soon as I know for certain.

(I went for the single-disc version - the two-discer is almost certainly off-limits to non-Poles)

UPDATE: Well, I have good news and bad news - the good news being that the single-disc edition of Katyn, distributed by ITI Home Video in Poland, does have English subtitles (though only on the main feature, not the extras).

However, the bad news is that it's been cropped from 2.35:1 to 16:9 - and it's definitely a case of cropping at the sides rather than opening up the original matte, Super 35 style.

A quick comparison with an unsubtitled Polish screener at the correct aspect ratio suggests that it probably won't make any significant difference - the 2.35:1 version has a lot of unused space at the edges of the frame, and I actually find the 16:9 compositions rather more pleasing to my eyes - but it obviously should be flagged up as a warning.

A full review will follow a.s.a.p. - and I'll also get comparative frame grabs done.

[tavernier]

And I'm sure this will be the only choice: since it didn't win the Oscar for Best Foreign Film, I doubt we'll see it in R1.

[MichaelB]

Well, it's had a colossal impact in Poland - it was the second biggest domestic hit last year after Shrek the Third, quite aside from the issues that it raises being explored endlessly in the Polish media. In fact, its saturation coverage has been such that readers of the daily paper Polska rather absurdly voted it the greatest Polish film of all time. (On the basis of what I've seen, I'd agree with the consensus that it's only middling by Wajda's standards).

And since there's enough of a Polish population in the US to justify an entire Polish DVD label, it'll probably appear in some form - but there's every possibility it'll be a clone of the Polish DVD after being wrung through a PAL-to-NTSC conversion box.

On the other hand, I don't think the cropping is as big an issue as one might imagine. I've been running both pictures side by side and I haven't spotted a single instance of unequivocal compositional damage - and the more I look at the 2.35:1 version, the more it looks like a 16:9 composition that's had bits added at the sides to no particularly helpful effect. Which may have been the intention all along, given that one of the principal backers was Polish state TV.

[jbeall]

And I'm sure this will be the only choice: since it didn't win the Oscar for Best Foreign Film, I doubt we'll see it in R1.

My guess is that if it finds a region 1 distributor, Sony Classics would be most likely to pick it up. They've already picked up The Counterfeiters and 12, and even I Served the King of England (the Czech Republic's entry, which wasn't one of the five finalists). Sony has historically been relatively good at picking up the more acclaimed foreign films.

[tavernier]

Hope you're right, but what's the last Wajda pic to get a cinema release in the US?

[miless]

Hope you're right, but what's the last Wajda pic to get a cinema release in the US?

which one was his last to get an oscar nom?

[jbeall]

I don't know what got a cinematic release, but at least several of his more recent films (Pan Tadeusz, Broken Silence, and Revenge) have gotten dvd releases. A Wajda film will never play outside of the big-city arthouse circuit, if even that, but at least his films are usually available in some form.

[MichaelB]

Hope you're right, but what's the last Wajda pic to get a cinema release in the US?

which one was his last to get an oscar nom?

Man of Iron in 1981, though he won an honorary Oscar in 2000. Steven Spielberg was one of the key lobbyists - the Polish DVDs include facsimiles of his letter to the Academy. (Schindler's List was strongly Wajda-influenced and indeed shot with many of his crew).

Interestingly, I'd rank his four Oscar-nominated films - the others being Land of Promise and The Young Ladies of Wilko - a notch below his major masterpieces like Kanal, Ashes and Diamonds, Landscape After Battle and Man of Marble. Then again, I've rarely been in sync with the Best Foreign Film nominations!

[MichaelB]

Here's my review - complete with comparative screengrabs so you can see the difference between the theatrical and DVD versions.