The Blue Light (1934, Riefenstahl) Pathfinder DVD

[HerrSchreck]

Just a heads up:

I picked this up not having any decent copies outside of shoddy 16mm VHS's available in this region for years.. and the end result is only a slight improvement. The print itself seems to be a pretty decently preserved 35mm print, but the disc itself is almost definitely analog sourced. I can say that the sound is pretty decent however (notwithstanding the state of sound recording on films of this small size in Germany in '34)... interesting to hear Guiseppe Becce's score, whose silent scores will finally start seeing the light of day after some FWMS resto's begin to hit.

The film of course is poetic and fabulous. With a proper disc, this could look as stunning as THE HOLY MOUNTAIN.

[Tommaso]

Which version of the film is it? You know, Riefenstahl re-cut it in 1953, and the original is far superior. You can identify the two versions easily: the original cut has a frame story where two tourists arrive in a car and finally come to see a picture of Junta, and then the main plot starts. Both versions are available on the German DVD by arthaus, and the 1932 version looks far superior imagewise (restored, I think by FWS). The 'silent' version which is a bonus on the Pathfinder is NOT original and should be discounted.

Can't remember whether the arthaus dvd was analog or not, but definitely a great improvement over VHS in the '32 version (the '53 version, however, is definitely video-sourced and looks quite bad in comparison). After what you write, I suppose the Pathfinder is inferior to the arthaus, especially considering the crime they apparently commited with their "Olympia" dvd.

[HerrSchreck]

It's got the complete original version where the arriving tourists spot the Junta photos sitting everywhere inside the cabin and ask what they are, and the penitent owners whip out the "Junta Book" and tell the story.

It also has the silent shorter version.

[Gordon]

DVD Talk reviewed it last week: www.dvdtalk.com/reviews/read.php?ID=23732

Nice to see that it's pillarboxed at the correct 1.19:1 ratio. I wouldn't mind seeing a comparison between this and the Athaus edition, though. I couldn't find any reviews of the Arthaus at DVD-Basen.

[Tommaso]

Couldn't find anything on the net, as well. According to the screen shots of the Pathfinder, it seems to be less sharp than I remember the arthaus (what the reviewer describes as 'very soft'), but without a direct comparison it is very hard to tell. The film in general has less contrast (intentionally) than some of her later works. At that time she was still very much under the influence of Fanck's aesthetics, who abhorred hard contrasts apparently. But there shouldn't be any lack of detail, nevertheless.

The arthaus is also 1.19 if I remember correctly, but the Pathfinder does not seem to be that bad in any case (and has subs, I suppose, which is surely an important point for most people here). If only they'd put on some nice extras apart from that curious silent version...

[denti alligator]

I've got the Arthaus and could send someone some caps to post a comparison (I don't have webspace of my own to do it).

[HerrSchreck]

The film in general has less contrast (intentionally) than some of her later works. At that time she was still very much under the influence of Fanck's aesthetics, who abhorred hard contrasts apparently. ...

That's a bizarre historical tidbit. Fancks work was of course more light than dark-- highlighting their deserved appellation ('mountain films', that is) when they first started appearing in the approx mid-20's, as a "breath of fresh air" versus the claustrophobia of the generally dark, studio bound work of the expressionist and kammerspiel (and even, I daresay, the New Objectivity) cinema of Germany, against which they ran alonside.

But looking at many shots in the gloriously photographed HOLY MOUNTAIN or PITZ PALU (or even the in my opinion underestimated SOS ICEBERG), there are many scenes shot with quite heavy contrast... black water sparking lens-flaring sunlight, the studio scenes in HOLY M, the night scenes, etc. There are moments where he clearly copped a slight hint of the expressionist aesthetic, using deep chiaroscuro to emphasize not just danger, but elevated stated of natural power, the majesty of nature, the human ideal he found in the free life of the white rugged mountain folk so stirring to the German soul. This man was no stranger to the power of contrast, and all the means of visual expression. There was a time where I swore that THE HOLY MOUNTAIN was absolutely positively with no close competition the very finest outdoor photography bar none... a feeling that's waned as the film has grown old and endlessly viewed in my memory, and other highly stylized contenders like Epstein's CHUTE USHER (autumnal gloom anyone? this film kills even BRUMES DE AUTOMNES by Kirsanoff for chilly damp melancholy of fall) appeared.

[Tommaso]

I see what you mean, and I do agree that Fanck was very aware of expressionism etc (especially in "Holy Mountain", of course). What I had in mind was, however, that I clearly remember Fanck saying somewhere (in his autobiography?) that he consciously chose film stock which did NOT have overmuch contrast in itself, and that he wanted to have a 'natural' picture with a good greyscale and no artificial manipulation. In a way, he never stopped being a documentary filmer in this respect. If you look at "Mont Blanc", "Iceberg" or "Der weiße Rausch", the contrasts are milder, far less pronounced than in, say, late 20s Lang. If I remember correctly, they are also milder than in "Piz Palü", which may simply be due to the individual dvds. Which does not mean there is never any hard contrast in these, as some would naturally occur when shooting in full sunlight.

I think that to a certain degree Riefenstahl still followed these somewhat 'naturalistic' ideals in "Das blaue Licht", notwithstanding that she chose special stock for some of the night scenes , which were not made by night, but were made to appear as if they were. There is a big difference between the lighting in "Das blaue Licht" and the much more 'artificial' lighting in 'Tiefland' (which reminds me of Cocteau in some of its effects).

[HerrSchreck]

Sure, I wasn't doubting that your read that Fanck said that. The very nature of his work more than proves the man's infautation with the basic appearance of nature as it existed, and clearly harbored a desire to translate that feeling of glorious power that filled him up when he was out there soaking up the mountains. There's not doubt that a studio-bound director like Lang (even beyond the cinema of the late-20's) created images generally far darker than Fanck.

I'm not so familiar with Fanck the man, so I don't know his working methods and how much latitude he gave dudes like Allgier & Schneeberger in the creation of imagery.. i e how specific he was in his instructions, i e did he get technical and demand certain lenses & filters and really craft the look of every shot, or did he, beyond the staging of the actors and perhaps the vantage point of the camera, leave the rest up to his cameramen.

I wonder because the films of his that for me seem to come closest to being masterpieces (though I don't really classify any of them that way, but a couple come close), for example THE HOLY MOUNTAIN & PITZ PALU, are those which exhibit such amazing meticulous photography, and enjoy moments of very strong contrast. This kind of amazing framing works very well in a mountain film in my view because it organizes and defines the backdrop of nature, creating such a strong context against which the drama plays out-- this versus how occasionally hypermeticulous framing can seem so dislocated from the onscreen action.. perfect example are the amazingly thought-out visuals of KAGEMUSHA, where the incredible planning of schematics of color & composition are so strong they actually start chipping away at the storytelling and draining it of power, maybe by distraction. It's a common syndrome in film today, where every college grad high on Storaro feels the need to "be a great cinematographer" from the very start, and skips the whole stylistic journey and cuts to his college catalog of Noticably Beautiful Shots.

Other films by Fanck, however, that lack the formal beauty of HOLY & PALU, like ICEBERG, MT BLANC etc, are just a notch down and register as (still pretty amazing, especially the endurance of the actors in ICEBERG) good adventures.

[Tommaso]

I'm not so familiar with Fanck the man, so I don't know his working methods and how much latitude he gave dudes like Allgier & Schneeberger in the creation of imagery.. i e how specific he was in his instructions, i e did he get technical and demand certain lenses & filters and really craft the look of every shot, or did he, beyond the staging of the actors and perhaps the vantage point of the camera, leave the rest up to his cameramen.

Probably the latter. Fanck stumbled more or less into filmmaking, he writes that he only went to a cinema AFTER he had shot his first filmed documentary footage, and he only did that in order to find out what to do with the footage in the first place. He quickly learned, of course, but there is always something of the dillettante in him (although of genius, of course). But he had surely a very keen idea of WHAT he wanted to achieve.

I wonder because the films of his that for me seem to come closest to being masterpieces (though I don't really classify any of them that way, but a couple come close), for example THE HOLY MOUNTAIN & PITZ PALU, are those which exhibit such amazing meticulous photography, and enjoy moments of very strong contrast.

"The Holy Mountain" is rather unusual for him. Apart from the fact that it was the only one of his films, apparently, to be tinted, the dancing scene at the beginning and also the studio-built ice palace (and the trick photography going with it) are somewhat rare treats in him. The ice palace, however, was originally a REAL ice palace created somewhere in the Swiss mountains, but its first incarnation melted down due to some hang-ups in the production. The special quality of "Piz Palü" may(!) be due to the involvement of Pabst, who directed all the 'dialogue' scenes, but may have had more influence on the film as a whole than is usually assumed. Curiously, it's perhaps this 'too perfect' quality that made me always like this film less than Fanck's other works. It's far better conceived, storywise, but it lacks a little bit of the charme that "Iceberg" and "Der weiße Rausch" exude.

this versus how occasionally hypermeticulous framing can seem so dislocated from the onscreen action.. perfect example are the amazingly thought-out visuals of KAGEMUSHA, where the incredible planning of schematics of color & composition are so strong they actually start chipping away at the storytelling and draining it of power, maybe by distraction.

It at least has an enormous distancing effect, but I guess this was precisely what Kurosawa was after. We're 'outside', as if watching a Greek tragedy unfold, and in this way it becomes almost more terrifying, because we are unable to be involved, psychologically. Look at the differences between "Throne of Blood" and "Ran", both Shakespeare adaptations and thus well comparable. The earlier film engages us much more directly, but "Ran" with its tableaux camera-style and 100%-planned compositions perfectly captures/invokes the helplessness of the characters in the viewer, who are subject to fate as much as we are subject to the filmmaker's plans. "Ran" is one of the most deeply unsettling films (which has nothing to do with subject matter, but one's own reaction) I ever came across because of this quality. "Kagemusha" is similar, but not quite as perfect in my view. Needless to say, I admire it as well.

Other films by Fanck, however, that lack the formal beauty of HOLY & PALU, like ICEBERG, MT BLANC etc, are just a notch down and register as (still pretty amazing, especially the endurance of the actors in ICEBERG) good adventures.

But even if they are weaker (something I'm not yet sure of), they still carry Fanck's penchant for mysticism/spirituality, and thus are more than only 'good adventures'. Mt Blanc is quite amazing in this respect, especially in the observatory scenes. If I'm not mistaken, this film also gets the credit for being the first sound film using partly electronic music (those deep, rumbling sounds in some scenes, made by a Trautonium). Fanck was a real innovator in many respects, and should deserve more credit than he usually gets, especially for (but not limited to) his influence on Riefenstahl, who - a rare treat for her - has repeatedly stated that she learned her craft completely from Fanck.

[HerrSchreck]

All very interesting and well stated points. On KAGE that's an interesting distinction, of taking what for me is the distraction of the hyperstrong cinematography vs the weaker plot, and experiencing it as a deliberate plot device. Though I'd say you're not getting kicked "out" of the film in the same way I do. For me falling out of the film is falling out of the film; doom & claustrophobia & inevitability can be communicated in more, for me anyhow, engaging ways, even via cinematography. I find RAN a far more successful enterprise than KAGEMUSHA.

On Fanck's sum output our opinions diverge. I admire his Ozu-like dedication to the same theme: Ozu elevated the familial melodrama to scales of perfect poetry & pathos; Fanck stuck his actors up in the mountains and saw how many times he could come up with different disasters to beat them over the head with (and have Ernst Udet hurry up to the rescue before he killed himself after making his deal with Hermann Göring.. tragedy because Udet was a beaucoup kool dude). The results in both cases-- though Fanck is no Ozu-- were always engaging, sometimes sublime. But for myself personally, the worst of Fanck's films are quite good, the best of his films quite excellent. But even THE HOLY MOUNTAIN makes me cringe at times via the rediculous cheeseball mannerisms of the love stories playing out (that bit with the scarf outside the theater... #-o ), by Fanck's obvious infatuation with Riefenstahl which reaches epic proportions of sighing adolescence (was the guy so infatuated that he couldn't see how poorly the woman danced? She moves in that film like an ape on rollerskates with a blow gun dart of poison fired into her big toe the way she hunches & raises her foot).. On the other hand the vision of nature and the ubermench's place within it makes my hairs prickle & stirs the 25% German in me & makes me wanta stand up & beat my fucking chest & summon the entire population of the planet into my living room to attend to my fingernails & cook & clean my apt like the lousy worthless bugs they all are.

[Tommaso]

. I find RAN a far more successful enterprise than KAGEMUSHA.

I also think "Ran" is ultimately the better film, but the differences are minor. What engages me in "Kagemusha" is how it so slowly builds up (really very little happens in its first 90 min. or so) and then unleashes all its tragic potential in pretty catastrophic and unrelenting manner. It's such a departure from his earlier samurai films with their quick cuts and experimental camera work that perhaps you miss these if you approach the film with an expection of seeing 50's Kurosawa in colour. It's something totally different, and it's slowgoing pace comes directly from "Dersu Uzala". I wonder, given that he worked in the USSR before, whether he had seen some Tarkovsky in between. Totally different style, of course, but just because of the 'slowness' of all his late films.

Fanck stuck his actors up in the mountains and saw how many times he could come up with different disasters to beat them over the head with

and that quite literally. Poor Leni only escaped death very luckily one or two times when he decided to bring down just another avalanche on her...

(and have Ernst Udet hurry up to the rescue before he killed himself after making his deal with Hermann Göring.. tragedy because Udet was a beaucoup kool dude).

Not quite sure about this one. Udet seems to have had a lot of personal problems, alcohol abuse being not the least of them. His suicide seems to have had very little to do with the political situation at that time. Udet was just another quiet player in the Reich's schemes in my view.

But even THE HOLY MOUNTAIN makes me cringe at times via the rediculous cheeseball mannerisms of the love stories playing out (that bit with the scarf outside the theater... #-o ), by Fanck's obvious infatuation with Riefenstahl which reaches epic proportions of sighing adolescence.

Much agreed. But Fanck was never really able to handle a storyline without getting into sentimentalisms. But the Riefenstahl infatuation is quite a special case. After all, he wrote the script of "Holy Mountain" especially for her, and there seem to have been hilarious scenes going on during the shoot with Fanck being dead jealous over Leni's short-lived affair with Luis Trenker (who called her an 'oily nanny-goat' in public afterwards).

(was the guy so infatuated that he couldn't see how poorly the woman danced? She moves in that film like an ape on rollerskates with a blow gun dart of poison fired into her big toe the way she hunches & raises her foot)..

LOOOOOL! I must note this down somewhere as my favourite HerrSchreck quote so far But seriously, Schreck, you nailed it. I fell down laughing when I first saw that opening of "Holy Mountain". On the other hand, she WAS quite famous as a dancer in the early 20s, and probably this dance scene does represent quite faithfully what she did in her dance shows then, and obviously people took it seriously. To her credit it must be said that she had had to give up dancing due to an injury even BEFORE she ever played in films, and so this scene probably wasn't up to her former standards. And in any case it's less hilarious than her dancing in "Tiefland" which - although it's hardly imaginable - looks even more stupid.

On the other hand the vision of nature and the ubermench's place within it makes my hairs prickle & stirs the 25% German in me & makes me wanta stand up & beat my fucking chest & summon the entire population of the planet into my living room to attend to my fingernails & cook & clean my apt like the lousy worthless bugs they all are.

Ah.... strangely, while you must have been writing this last evening, I watched Powell&Pressburger's "49th Parallel", and that film should definitely cure you from any Germanic infatuations (just in case you need an antidote). Associating Fanck's nature mysticism with the Ãœbermensch and implicitly the Third Reich has been an old critical stance, ever since Kracauer first formulated it, but I'd say there is too much hindsight in it. Fanck - although he read Nietzsche - in my view was pretty unpolitical, and the vision of nature is coming directly out of German romanticism (or international romanticism, just check out Shelley's "Mont Blanc" poem).
Fanck's role during the Third Reich is rather ambiguous, though. First he made a strange kind of propaganda film for the Japanese ("The Daughter of the Samurai", with Setsuko Hara in her first great role), and later a film called "Ein Robinson", which was totally influenced by Goebbels' ministry, and which he made under surveillance of some of Goebbels' spies, as Fanck was considered unreliable politically by then. The film was terribly re-cut by the censors, features a really dull hurrah-story, and lots of Fanck's beautiful landscape photography was cut out as unnecessary for hammering-in the message. What remains of it is truly magnificent (Patagonia, this time) and makes the film a must-see despite of its shortcomings. However, Fanck was so annoyed about the story forced upon him and the butchering of the film itself that he declined having his name mentioned in the credits. And that was the end of his career.

[Michael Kerpan]

> First he made a strange kind of propaganda film for the Japanese
> ("The Daughter of the Samurai", with Setsuko Hara in her first great
> role),

I've seen this -- and (as a result) I have no desire to see anything else by Fanck. It also devotes the last third or so of the films to putting its two leads on a mountain (in this case a _live_ volcano) and letting things happen to them.

This was not Hara's first "great" role -- that honor belongs to her co-starring role in Yamanaka's infinitely finer "Kochiyama Soshun" -- though her almost inaudible whispering of German now and then in DotS is rather cute.

[HerrSchreck]

Udet's alcoholism & drug use & general Weimer hard-partyanimalism (while flipping his plane in the most unbelievable stunts) is precisely what endears his personality to me. Udet was not your usual Nazi bureaucrat in that he was a hugely beloved war hero/media personality who was sucked in and became so depressed by his own impotence... and his consciousness of how far and low he'd fallen since the good old days of the teens & 20's, that he blew his head off. This is all pretty much cut & dry history as far as the man's bio was concerned. The Russian front and the logistical slide & stupidity it slipped into was really the beginning of the end for him.

As for Fanck, he often expressed his ideas about the lofty place the German mountain man occupied in the world... in the end when a man dies either for a friend or an ideal, there's always the faithful guide clueing in the weeping woman "You don't understand... XYZ was a true German/man of the mountains... he placed his loyalty and his word above his life yadda yadda"

Meine ehre ist treue!

[Tommaso]

I've seen this -- and (as a result) I have no desire to see anything else by Fanck. It also devotes the last third or so of the films to putting its two leads on a mountain (in this case a _live_ volcano) and letting things happen to them.

This last third is precisely the part that I love about the film. He just transferred his usual mountain themes to Japan. That volcano scene is really freaked-out and looks pretty unbelievable even today. On the other hand the actors must have been almost as crazy as he to do this part.... The rest of the film ranges between unbearable (the propaganda bits) and quite acceptable (acting and camera) in my view.
I stand corrected as to Hara. I haven't seen that Yamanaka film, but judging from "Humanity and paper balloons", I believe it must be superior to Fanck's effort. Still she's indeed rather cute here, not just because of the whispered German...

Schreck, I agree of course that Fanck often used final titles like the one you quoted. The phrasing is quite similar to what the nazis used later, but that doesn't mean he had the same intentions. Like with so many other things, they took over and used this kind of heroism (which ultimately seems to come from Romanticism) for their own goals . That doesn't make it any better, but it doesn't prove Fanck embraced Nazism or paved the way for it.

[Michael Kerpan]

If the last third of "Daughter of the Samurai" is typical Fanck, I definitely have no need to see any of his other work. In my opinion, this is some of the worst flm direction I've ever seen.

Most of the scenes of ordinary day to day country life in this film were directed by Juzo Itami's father -- and these were generally okay (if far below the level of Ozu or Naruse).

Yamanaka's "Kochiyama Soshun" (no translation -- as Soshun KOCHIYAMA is the name of the central character, a sort of urban Robin Hood) is very good -- very close to the level of "Humanity and Paper Balloons" -- but I know of no subbed version.

[HerrSchreck]

[Schreck, I agree of course that Fanck often used final titles like the one you quoted. The phrasing is quite similar to what the nazis used later, but that doesn't mean he had the same intentions. Like with so many other things, they took over and used this kind of heroism (which ultimately seems to come from Romanticism) for their own goals . That doesn't make it any better, but it doesn't prove Fanck embraced Nazism or paved the way for it.

O my goodness, I never said Fanck was a Nazi! I tied him in to the prenazi idea of the ubermensch which I meant in the general Male Fantasy Ideal (think Japan=Bushido, American = Cowboy) of the perfect tough guy as imagined by the German and philosophically labeled by Nietzsche.... who for gods sakes people was not an nazi, antisemite, and who loathed antisemites! That knee jerk reaction by many historians by thinking that "ubermenschen", because co-opted in the absurd Aryan ideal propagated by Thule & Nazis et al, retroactively made Neitszche a prenazi or something, the whole premise is absurd. If I go mad and start braining people with copies of my TOKYO STORY dvd, that doesn't make Ozu or the CC complicit it murder!

But yes I was teasing-- the last quote (Meine ehre ist treue!) was the motto of the SS! (Though I never saw Fanck use that phrase before.)

[Tommaso]

I tied him in to the prenazi idea of the ubermensch which I meant in the general Male Fantasy Ideal (think Japan=Bushido, American = Cowboy) of the perfect tough guy as imagined by the German and philosophically labeled by Nietzsche

Good comparison, indeed. Apart from making our brief Kurosawa discussion appear less off-topic, there is certainly a similarity concerning that male ideal. The German variant however is far less 'rationalized' or 'hierarchically organized' if compared to the Samurai codex, and Fanck's approach to nature seems rather to be imbued by general ideas about the 'sublime in nature' as theorized by Burke or in a different way by Kant. Nature as something elevating and terrible at the same time, and it seems that Nietzsche combined these earlier, 18th century ideas with his own special brand of philosophical reasoning.

That knee jerk reaction by many historians by thinking that "ubermenschen", because co-opted in the absurd Aryan ideal propagated by Thule & Nazis et al, retroactively made Neitszche a prenazi or something, the whole premise is absurd.

Exactly, but that is analogous to the way that Fanck has been discussed very often, not just in post WWII Germany. Think of how Kracauer argues that the opening shot in Riefenstahl's "Triumph", with the Fuhrer's plane coming through the clouds is supposed to come directly out of Fanck's visuals. This may even be true, but Kracauer's drift of course is that Fanck by having used similar shots in his seemingly harmless mountain films has prepared the Germans for Hitler/Riefenstahl's aesthetics and politics. Which I find totally unconvincing.

[HerrSchreck]

Kracauer was as useless as tits on a bull.

[Tommaso]

Well said, but he is still taken very seriously here in Germany. You can't imagine the over-sensitivity some people still display here when it comes to Riefenstahl. Although there are no longer groups of demonstrating people before the cinema whenever somebody dares to show one of her films (which was quite normal up to the early 90s), it's still difficult to talk about her as a cinematic artist without being immediately immersed in some very general debates about the propaganda value of her films and the Third Reich as a whole. Kracauer's book however is still valuable as a reference compendium on the more important - and some not so important - works of Weimar cinema. Just don't believe his interpretations.

[vogler]

Just a heads up:

I picked this up not having any decent copies outside of shoddy 16mm VHS's available in this region for years.. and the end result is only a slight improvement. The print itself seems to be a pretty decently preserved 35mm print, but the disc itself is almost definitely analog sourced.

I just received this disc today and I am shocked - what a piece of shit. Are Pathfinder the new facets? The source is definitely analog - look along the top edge and you can see obvious evidence (particularly on the third image posted below).

The Pathfinder is drastically inferior to the Arthaus dvd. I have ripped the subs from the pathfinder and retimed them for the arthaus edition so that I can play them along with it. Currently I only have an avi rip of the arthaus dvd but I am going to order a copy immediately. If anyone wants a copy of the subs (srt file) then send me a message. They are timed for the avi so they should be correct for the arthaus dvd.

I love this film and visually it is absolutely stunning so the Pathfinder VHS quality disc just won't do at all. As the title implies light is very important in the film but on the Pathfinder disc it just looks very dull and lifeless.

Here are some comparison screen caps but please remember that the arthaus caps are actually from a highly compressed avi file. The actual dvd will look much better but even these look far superior to the shitty Pathfinder DVD (VHS?). I will replace the avi screen caps with ones from the dvd as soon as I receive it.

TOP - Pathfinder BOTTOM - Arthaus (recompressed avi file)





















ENOUGH SAID!

[Tommaso]

Oh My GOD!!!!!
Whatever you think of Leni, she did not deserve THIS! And the arthaus is not even THAT perfect compared with other dvds....