Murnau, Borzage and Fox

[zedz]

Just to lower the tone for a minute:

Assuming, or hoping against hope, that Fox will continue with the annual lavish box set splurge, what's the best way of getting the message to them that they should spend a couple of extra dollars on their premium product in order to:
1) Provide secure, robust and user friendly disc housings
2) Deliver discs to customers unscratched
3) Eliminate flipper discs

It's ridiculous that such high-cost luxury sets from a major studio are plagued with these problems. I know we're a small, captive audience, but don't Fox consider this a bad look - and surely these products are, for them, primarily about corporate prestige?

So anyway, any suggestions for the best way of getting this message to somebody who counts in a vaguely constructive way?

[Tommaso]

Apart from bombarding them with e-mails, I see no reasonable way. However, I'm not sure whether this will change the situation. Had they read the numerous complaints about the Ford at Fox set here or at amazon, they would have surely come up with something different for the Murnau Borzage already. With the new set, they should at least notice that they get faulty sets returned from amazon or other sellers. So either they know already that something must change, or they simply don't care (which is what I suspect).

surely these products are, for them, primarily about corporate prestige?

They should be, but it seems enough that they LOOK lavish superficially, i.e. super-sized boxes and great promotional photos to sell the product. However, they don't seem to pay attention to the details. Take for instance the inclusion of the CC "Young Mr. Lincoln" with unaltered disc and menu design into the Ford set; it breaks up the whole look of the set. Same for the seemingly inexplicable choice of flipper discs in both sets, which equally ruins the 'corporate' look, as some discs now of course don't have label-designs anymore; all this quite apart from the playing problems and the fact that all the materials on the flippers would easily have fitted on normal double layered discs, with the sole exception of "Sunrise" perhaps (but here they could have simply put the European version out on an extra disc). Or the remarkable lack of audio-commentaries or other significant extras on most of the discs, despite the well-made documentary disc. The books are great, but are also far from being in-depth.All this gives me the feeling that they didn't want to produce a 'real artwork', only something which looks like one. Well, at least we have the films.

[zedz]

surely these products are, for them, primarily about corporate prestige?

They should be, but it seems enough that they LOOK lavish superficially, i.e. super-sized boxes and great promotional photos to sell the product.

Probably right. The people they're most eager to impress probably wouldn't actually watch any of these films in a million years.

[Jean-Luc Garbo]

Do schools even teach film narrative and rhythm anymore? They didn't when I was there. Everything was ideological interpretation. Which is why a brilliant theorist like Bordwell has become persona non grata in academic circles.

Dear lord that's depressing. Why not just make it a film historiography class if that's all they'll do to teach film. I'm curious how Bordwell has been excluded though. Didn't he write the book on film for these courses?

[domino harvey]

As a graduate student in a film studies program, let me reassure you guys that yes, theory and narrative structures are still being taught alongside histories and general analytical approaches. Film Art and Film History show up in undergrad classes all the time and I'm actually in a class right now that uses Bordwell, Staiger, and Thompson's Classical Hollywood Cinema as its sole textbook. There's always going to be film classes that pander to the masses, but it's thankfully not yet an epidemic.

[GringoTex]

As a graduate student in a film studies program, let me reassure you guys that yes, theory and narrative structures are still being taught alongside histories and general analytical approaches. Film Art and Film History show up in undergrad classes all the time and I'm actually in a class right now that uses Bordwell, Staiger, and Thompson's Classical Hollywood Cinema as its sole textbook. There's always going to be film classes that pander to the masses, but it's thankfully not yet an epidemic.

I was in grad school when Bordwell dropped his Post-Theory bomb in 1996. You would have thought every crit/cult professor in the nation has been bitchslapped personally by Bordwell. They were furious! This was a time when Classical Hollywood Cinema would have never been found in a graduate class- maybe in an sophomore Narrative Strategies class if you were lucky. It wasn't bout pandering to the masses- it was about ridding film studies of aesthetic evaluation in favor of ideological interpretation or reception studies. At all the big film academic conferences back then, I only remember a single session whose subject was a director- it was one on Kielsowski- and most of the participants openly boycotted it.

Anyway, for us "aesthetes," Bordwell was our Martin Luther. It sounds like things have gotten better.

[Tommaso]

To go back to a discussion started some pages earlier, i.e. the strangeness of "Liliom". I'm pretty undecided whether the line delivery is intentional or not; its artificiality curiously reminded me of some moments in "M" and also a lot of Riefenstahl's first sound films (both with Fanck and also her own "Das blaue Licht"), the only similar instances of such deliveries I can recall at the moment; and there I always suspected that they are the result of inexperience with the medium. However, intentional or not, in "Liliom" they surely highlight the artificiality of the whole experience, and a sense of alienation that seems to me at the heart of the film. The outside world of the fairground is in itself 'artificial', and this outside world with its problems constantly creeps into the inner world of Liliom and Julie and causes danger to their love affair. I'm still amazed at those shots inside the house in which we can see the fairground looming through the window and those menacing 'Bauhaus' architecture that continues inside the house, just on the right-hand-side of that window. This window and what we see through it, as is finally made clear by the train coming through it, might thus represent 'death' both literally and figuratively, as the 'death'/menace to Liliom's and Julie's relationship. When Liliom lies on his deathbed in that room, he curiously seems to be far more 'alive' than anything else in there.

I haven't read the original play, but I found it interesting to compare this version to Lang's, only made three years later. A lot of it looks actually very similar, the scenes at the carousel or some of the more 'peaceful' night shots for instance, but in Borzage's version Liliom comes over as a much more likeable character who is only driven by circumstances into what he's doing, not so much by an inherent flaw in his character as in Lang. And much as I admire Lang's handling of the heaven scenes, I always had difficulties seeing them for what they are in itself and not like some proto-AMOLAD-version; Borzage's "celestial railroad" by contrast struck me as an invention of genius, with its surreal 'hell car' and indeed the complete subversion of our expectations, not just in the case of Gabriel Hornblower.

I am most amazed, though, at how Borzage relies far less on the effect of dialogue but basically continues the expressiveness of looks and gestures from his silent films. Take those two scenes where Julie tries to tell Liliom of her pregnancy: the set-up is exactly the same both times (he on the stairs, she looking up), even as far as camera angles are concerned. But in the second scene you already KNOW the development in Julie's attitude even before she says something, just by the expressiveness on Hobart's face. There are other such moments, and curiously Hobart even manages to save the ending for me (which I expected would be handled in another "7th Heaven"-style melodrama moment, but is wonderfully toned down here). There is a strange 'understatement', even an 'otherworldliness' to her which never feels forced and has enormous emotional impact, paradoxically. I fully understand why Cornell was so smitten with her.

The effect of all this to me is that I have to agree with Schreck when he says this looks like an avantgarde film, though I suspect this was not really Borzage's intention. In any case, I found "Liliom" completely striking; my favourite Borzage so far, and I doubt there will be anything in the set that I have yet to watch that will come close.

[peerpee]

This was a time when Classical Hollywood Cinema would have never been found in a graduate class- maybe in an sophomore Narrative Strategies class if you were lucky....

It sounds like things have gotten better.

In 94/95 in the UK, we were using primarily the Bordwell books Domino describes (FILM ART and CLASSICAL HOLLYWOOD CINEMA) + Tino Balio's AMERICAN FILM INDUSTRY, Caughie's THEORIES OF AUTHORSHIP and Barthes' IMAGE-MUSIC-TEXT, during pretty intense Film Theory study. All our various courses were riddled with auteur-based study and we spent 2 years on John Ford! (it was really great).

[foggy eyes]

In 94/95 in the UK, we were using primarily the Bordwell books Domino describes (FILM ART and CLASSICAL HOLLYWOOD CINEMA) + Tino Balio's AMERICAN FILM INDUSTRY, Caughie's THEORIES OF AUTHORSHIP and Barthes' IMAGE-MUSIC-TEXT, during pretty intense Film Theory study. All our various courses were riddled with auteur-based study and we spent 2 years on John Ford! (it was really great).

My experience was/is very similar. However, it depends on who teaches and devises the course(s) - we have two film studies departments at my university, and although one is like the above, the other is pretty heavy on theory (feminist, gender, queer, star, transnational/diasporic/Third Cinema, etc) at the expense of the good stuff. The difference is down to both the inclinations of staff (heads of department) and institutional pressures...

[Cinetwist]

In 94/95 in the UK, we were using primarily the Bordwell books Domino describes (FILM ART and CLASSICAL HOLLYWOOD CINEMA) + Tino Balio's AMERICAN FILM INDUSTRY, Caughie's THEORIES OF AUTHORSHIP and Barthes' IMAGE-MUSIC-TEXT, during pretty intense Film Theory study. All our various courses were riddled with auteur-based study and we spent 2 years on John Ford! (it was really great).

My experience was/is very similar. However, it depends on who teaches and devises the course(s) - we have two film studies departments at my university, and although one is like the above, the other is pretty heavy on theory (feminist, gender, queer, star, transnational/diasporic/Third Cinema, etc) at the expense of the good stuff. The difference is down to both the inclinations of staff (heads of department) and institutional pressures...

As an even more recent student, I'll chime in too. Bordwell's Film Art was still very much the bible of film studies and he's still well respected. But I have to agree, that most professors were anti-auteur (often perversely so) and uniformly obsessed with genre and transnational theory in particular.

I only took a couple of modules, and whilst I did find the transnational really interesting, it was a bit depressing that aesthetics were seen as a non-issue and the question of a film's quality was moot. Sure, Notting Hill and Billy Elliot say a lot about the film industry that created them etc etc, but are these really films you want to be studying? Nah...

[Zazou dans le Metro]

Well from the standpoint of the class of a decade earlier Bordwell was unheard of as we struggled with Lacan, Metz Althusser and the like. At that time and place (London) Film studies was in thrall to the editorial staff of Screen but thankfully comfort was found in Samizdat copies of Raymond Durgnat.

Regarding Billy Elliot's Weddings and funerals et al I think this has less to do with Film Studies per se than the creeping malaise of McKeeism. I remember in the mid 90's coming out of his dissection of Casablanca, leaving its mouldering corpse on the table, and being alarmed at the burning eyes of zealots surrounding me. (Some very well known personalities included).

[HerrSchreck]

countdown to thread-splitoff...

[GringoTex]

7th Heaven

I think Borzage goes down a lot better while drinking, which is what I just did while watching this. There are so many errors in judgment, taste, and mise-en-scene to glide over and reach those moments of sublime perfection. When Janet Gaynor removed her stockings, I audibly gasped- one of the sexiest things I've ever seen in film. And if I had to be someone's bitch ass punk cellmate, I'd want to be Charles Farrell's.

Borzage just doesn't know when to quit. If he were forced to cut all his films down to 60 minutes, they might all be masterpieces. I don't mean to be overly negative, because he does give moments of unprecedented beauty.

[Wittsdream]

I posted this on the "Bargain" thread earlier today, and thought it worthy to mention here as well. This set has now been significantly reduced at both the DVD Planet and Deep Discount sites to around $115 + change (around a 52% discount).

For those that couldn't afford it at the outset (like myself), here's your chance!

Murnau, Borzage & Fox Box

[swo17]

Why is there such a disparity between these prices listed on amazon and the ones shown on the actual sites? DVD Planet's site currently shows this for $182 and DeepDiscount's for $265.

[Shrew]

Why is there such a disparity between these prices listed on amazon and the ones shown on the actual sites? DVD Planet's site currently shows this for $182 and DeepDiscount's for $265.

My guess: They had to clear out some sets of these at a low price but didn't want to be forced into ordering even more and reselling at said low price.

Anyway, the deals are sold out now.

[kcpuden1]

For those that couldn't afford it at the outset (like myself), here's your chance!

Murnau, Borzage & Fox Box

Received mine today. All disks look great. No problems with the packaging. Major Hat Tip to Wittsdream.

[Perkins Cobb]

Does this (the firings a few months ago at Fox Home Video) mean it's a foregone conclusion that there won't be another set this year comparable to Ford or Murnau/Borzage? Such was implied at the Home Theater Forum, but I don't put much stock in the "info" over there.

[Wittsdream]

For those that couldn't afford it at the outset (like myself), here's your chance!

Murnau, Borzage & Fox Box

Received mine today. All disks look great. No problems with the packaging. Major Hat Tip to Wittsdream.

Glad to help! I just received my set on Tuesday, and everything arrived nice and snug in a box directly from Deep Discount that seemed to be designed specifically for this set. Anyway, I'm content that I waited a few months longer for a deal like this (it saved me at least $60, which I, in turn, used towards the purchase of three other sought-after films). :-"

[Perkins Cobb]

Jonathan Rosenbaum offers some entertaining bitching about this set ... along with a parting swipe at the Beav:

No less awesome in its own way is the justifiably touted Murnau, Borzage and Fox package, containing no less than a dozen DVDs, three of them two-sided, and two coffee-table-sized books with texts by Janet Bergstrom, the second of which is devoted to Murnau’s lost 4 Devils. Yet I can’t help but feel flummoxed by the fact that this second package was put together by people who know next to nothing about either the merchandise they’re handling or the cinephiles they’re servicing. The whole thing comes in a massive box that’s too big to fit on any of my shelves (even the ones that carry coffee-table books), and much of it is the reverse of user-friendly in other ways as well. It’s as if it were designed to be the only DVD box set one would ever think of owning, comprising a formidable piece of furniture in its own right, with its own built-in altar for worship. (I’m told that 2007’s Ford at Fox set, which I don’t have in toto, was similarly unwieldy and impractical, however welcome its own contents were.) The most valuable contribution to film history in this whole set is probably what’s left of Borzage’s The River (1928), and this is harder to locate than anything else because it isn’t even mentioned on any of the sleeves. (For the record, you can find it on the flip side of Borzage’s 7th Heaven [1927]—a logical place for it to be, but why can’t it be identified somewhere in the box?) For most of my related gripes, simply compare the sensibly and modestly packaged two-disc set devoted to The River released on the invaluable Filmmuseum label (http://www.edition-filmmuseum.com" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;), which I wrote about three columns back. Here you can find Bergstrom’s excellent 36-minute Murnau and Borzage at Fox—The Expressionist Heritage, which Fox essentially chose to bypass by assigning a studio pro and nonscholar to remake it, just as it also inexplicably chose to bypass Bergstrom’s superb documentary about 4 Devils (which Fox previously included on its limited-edition DVD of Sunrise [1928]) and reduce its contents to the dimensions of a much simpler coffee-table book. I guess what’s mistrusted in both cases is seriousness. I know, I know. We’re supposed to overlook these maddening irritations and simply be grateful for what the studios decide to impart to us, in whatever arbitrary manner they choose; criticize them and they’re apt to punish us for our presumption. This must be why DVD Beaver chose to tactfully omit my selection of this box set for their “Bad Bad Bad” category in their end-of-year poll, which I accounted for, simply and parenthetically, as “invaluable materials, atrociously packaged.”

[Max von Mayerling]

Thank you for posting that - I did not realize that Bergstrom's 4 Devils doc from the earlier Sunrise release was not included in the Box. I was on the verge of selling my old Sunrise...

[thethirdman]

The 4 Devils doc is in the box set. It is on the City Girl disc rather than the Sunrise disc.

[Antoine Doinel]

I would love to know what Rosenbaum thinks about airline peanuts and envelope glue.

[Perkins Cobb]

Er, I probably should've added that Rosenbaum's Cinema Scope column is often accuracy-challenged.

It's a shame, because when he first started writing it, it seemed like one of the best sources of info on non-US DVDs, but now he's usually wrong or else six months behind the Criterion Forum.

[HerrSchreck]

That is an absolutely idiotic review. Yeah, Jon, don't go thru one of the most important--and monumental-- releases in dvd-dom en toto before you review it.

My jaw dropped for several reasons: indeed the 4 Devils doc is in there on the City Girl disc (in fact I believe it's the frst extra listed). But, with coffee table books of this size, with that amount of effort and expense put into them, he's complaining that the box is the size of its contents??? (there's no empty space in the box.. it merely accomodates the books and the disc binder) Does he try to fit large illustrated art books into his paperback bookcase too?

What were they supposed to do, pull out a fricking magic act and fit a large hardbound glossy book, and a large, glossy coffee table softcover into a standard amaray?

You can nitpick if you want about the utility of the Ford binder's method of attaching the discs to the rubber stoppers, etc (or the slip-in sleeves in this M&B@F case... it's been done and I can understand it because it caused disc damage) ... but to complain that this dvd release of all dvd releases is not the size of an amaray and therefore (o the TERROR!!) doesn't fit on your collection shelf-- talk about looking a gift thoroughbred horse ("Khartoum"... stroke... "Khartoum"... stroke) up the unwiped szzzphincter!

I wonder if he acquires valuable framed works of art, then complains they don't fit into his postcard collection?