Story of Sin

[Ribs]

The life of a beautiful, young and pious woman is thrown into chaos when her parents takes in a dashingly handsome lodger. Having embarked on a torrid affair, the lodger goes off to Rome to seek a divorce from his estranged wife.

Unable to live apart from her beloved, our hero leaves home only to fall prey to the infatuations and lusts of a band of noble admirers, unsavoury criminals and utopian do-gooders…

The only feature Walerian Borowczyk (The Beast, The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Miss Osbourne) made in his native Poland, Story of Sin transforms Stefan Zeromski’s classic melodrama into a deliriously surrealistic meditation on l’amour fou.

SPECIAL EDITION CONTENTS:
[*]2K restoration from the original film negative
[*]High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) and Standard Definition DVD presentations
[*]New subtitle translation
[*]New 2K restorations from the original negatives of Borowczyk’s ground-breaking Polish shorts: Once Upon a Time (co-directed by Jan Lenica), Dom (co-directed by Lenica) and The School
[*]New introduction by poster designer Andrzej Klimowski
[*]New interview with Story of Sin lead actor Grazyna Dlugolecka
[*]New interview featurette on Borowczyk's career in Poland by Daniel Bird (co-founder Friends of Walerian Borowczyk)
[*]New interview featurette on Borowczyk’s innovate use of classical music in his films by writer and filmmaker David Thompson
[*]Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Andrzej Klimowski

FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Fully illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new and archival writing, including an exclusive interview with the producer of Story of Sin, director Stanislaw Rozewicz; a text by art historian and one-time Borowczyk collaborator, Szymon Bojko; and excerpts from Borowczyk’s memoirs presented in English for the first time.

[zedz]

Another short, Banner of Youth, is available on NINA's Anthology of Polish Experimental Animation set (which everybody should own).

Great news that this is finally happening! Congratulations, Michael.

[MichaelB]

Daniel Bird deserves all the plaudits - I have absolutely nothing to do with this release. But it's in very very safe hands.

[Lino]

Been checking the Arrow thread on an almost daily basis since it was announced that this movie was recently restored. Just so stupidly glad this is finally happening. Particularly glad about this:

New 2K restorations from the original negatives of Borowczyk’s ground-breaking Polish shorts: Once Upon a Time (co-directed by Jan Lenica), Dom (co-directed by Lenica) and The School

Boro's connoisseurs would've already realized by now that these were not the only polish shorts he's made. Is there a chance for Arrow to include more in the "More to be announced!" category? Is "Requited Sentiments / Nagrodzone uczucie" a possibility? What about "Strip-Tease", "Banner of Youth" and "Street Art"? Last time I recall, Arrow wanted to encapsulate all of Boro's polish works on a single edition.

[MichaelB]

Obviously, Arrow would love to include every surviving scrap of footage that he shot in Poland (well, duh), but sadly all current signs are that it may not be possible in this case.

But if this does turn out to be the situation, you can rest assured that this is not for want of effort on Daniel's part and that it really was completely outside his control. Most people would have given up long before now.

Happily, the three shorts that are definitely being included are the three most important ones both historically and artistically.

[reaky]

Story of Sin feels choppy and accelerated in its later stages to me. Is there evidence of any cut footage?

[jsteffe]

Will this be Region A/B or just Region B? I'm planning to order it for myself regardless, but I'd like to get it for my library as well!

[swo17]

Not only will it be Region A/B, there will be a US-specific release.

[MichaelB]

Indeed - like Dr Jekyll, it's being simultaneously released on both sides of the Atlantic.

[swo17]

Though unlike that, this will be Arrow Academy everywhere, as opposed to Arrow Video in the U.S.

[MichaelB]

Although the actual Dr Jekyll disc is identical regardless of where it's purchased - it just serves up the Arrow Video ident on Region A machines and the Arrow Academy one on Region B ones.

[dbird]

Reaky - this is a new restoration from the negative and is completely uncut.

In 2001, Borowczyk published a pamphlet in which he claimed that the only scene that he was forced to drop from the edit was of a political rather than sexual nature.

Borowczyk's editing, particularly from Story of Sin, can sometimes feel 'choppy', but this was a conscious stylistic choice - Dr Jekyll is the best example.

[wojtek]

Hi everyone, my name is Wojtek and I run the company that has restored this movie (among many other Polish classics).
Just wanted to mention that the restoration was done from a 4K scan (done using a Lasergraphics Director in HDR mode) of the original camera negative. The color grading was supervised by Grzegorz Kędzierski (Polish DP, who worked a lot with Zygmunt Samosiuk as his assistant and cameraman) and Daniel Bird.
The restoration itself was also supervised by Daniel Bird and by James White (Arrow)

Should you have any questions, please feel free to ask.

The company I've mentioned is Fixafilm (restoration.fixafilm.com)

[reaky]

Reaky - this is a new restoration from the negative and is completely uncut.

In 2001, Borowczyk published a pamphlet in which he claimed that the only scene that he was forced to drop from the edit was of a political rather than sexual nature.

Borowczyk's editing, particularly from Story of Sin, can sometimes feel 'choppy', but this was a conscious stylistic choice - Dr Jekyll is the best example.

Thanks for the information, Daniel. I'm really looking forward to this, the first Boro I ever saw. If we could get a release of La Marge, all my Borowczyk needs will be catered for.

[MichaelB]

I've seen the restoration on the big screen, and am very happy to endorse it - I don't think any purchasers of Arrow's previous Borowczyk discs will be the slightest bit disappointed with this one. Compared with earlier video releases, it's quite literally a revelation.

[criterion10]

If we could get a release of La Marge, all my Borowczyk needs will be catered for.

Aren't there a multitude of rights issues with La Marge? (I believe it's with Studio Canal, and the soundtrack has numerous songs that would need to be cleared accordingly.) Nonetheless, would love to see this come to fruition as well, so I hope something could be worked out...

[MichaelB]

There are indeed a multitude of rights issues.

It's unsurprisingly top of Arrow's wishlist now that the other major Borowczyks have all been dealt with (the UK rights to Behind Convent Walls have sadly gone elsewhere), but the ball isn't currently in their court.

[Aunt Peg]

How about Lulu?

It's never been released in any English language market that I know of.

[spectre]

There's an English dub of it floating around the internet, so I presume it must have received some English-friendly VHS release at one time or other, right?

[Ron]

I am very happy that Arrow will now release the long awaited Story of Sin. Especially I am looking forward to the very rare Polish shorts, which I have never seen before.

La Marge, Lulu or Love Rites would be fine for the next Arrow release to complete my collection. La Marge was released on DVD by Trash Mountain Video in Japan a couple of years ago, but unfortunately it was optically cencored in many parts of the movie, what makes the release pretty useless.

[antnield]

Hopefully in a position to provide a full run-down next week, but there's a lot more bonus content to be announced for this one!

[antnield]

Final specs:

· 2K restoration from the original film negative
· High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) and Standard Definition DVD presentations
· New subtitle translation
· Audio commentary by Samm Deighan and Kat Ellinger
· Introduction by poster designer Andrzej Klimowski
· The First Sinner, a new interview with Story of Sin lead actor Grażyna Długołęcka
· The Music Box, film critic and documentarian David Thompson on the use of classical music in Borowczyk’s films
· Stories of Sin, a video essay by Daniel Bird (Friends of Walerian Borowczyk) concerning the director’s obsessions
· New 2K restorations from the original negatives of Borowczyk’s ground-breaking Polish shorts: Once Upon a Time (co-directed by Jan Lenica), Dom (co-directed by Lenica) and The School, with optional audio commentaries by art historian Szymon Bojko (Once Upon a Time), composer Włodzimierz Kotońsk (Dom) and Daniel Bird (The School)
· Miscellaneous, a video essay on Borowczyk and Lenica’s contributions to newsreels and documentaries on art history
· Street Art, a short newsreel documentary about poster art co-written by Borowczyk
· Tools of the Trade, an interview with Juliusz Zamecznik, son of photographer and graphic artist Wojciech Zamecznik
· Poster Girl, an interview with poster artist, illustrator and print maker Teresa Byszewska, who appears (briefly) in Dom
· Trailer
· Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Andrzej Klimowski

[M Sanderson]

Can't wait. Love all the Borowczyk releases and am hungry for more.

Years ago I read Pete Tombs' book Immoral Tales and it's great to see films by the directors and in the genres featured, getting the highest level of home video releases.

Somehow in my mind I confuse this film with one involving a wooden horse, possibly set in Spain, by Larraz. Or I could be condensing multiple titles.

[MichaelB]

That's Larraz's The Coming of Sin.

Although when Kat Ellinger told me that she'd been hired to do a commentary for the Borowczyk film, she initially referred to it The Coming of Sin, so I just assumed that it was the Larraz film and congratulated her.

(I haven't heard the commentary yet, but I hear that it's exhaustively detailed - they got the gig because of their Daughters of Darkness podcasts, which are well worth a listen. They've just finished a four-part series on Elio Petri.)

[Jean-Luc Garbo]

Samm Deighan and Kat Ellinger are the best so it's great to see them working with Arrow again. Between that and the shorts, I can hardly wait. I'm really amazed at how Arrow has found some of the best writers for these films.