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Returning to my above discussion of the history of the believer/rationalist/cynic thought structure (which we see in Stalker, among other places), I've since found an example earlier than Pascal.
It's in the Old Testament, the third and fourth chapters of 1 Esdras, a book held as part of the deuterocanon in the Eastern Orthodox Church (and also Oriental Orthodoxy), and as apocryphal by Protestants and Roman Catholics.
It's a lengthy passage, so I won't quote it in full (but it can be read here, it's chapters 3 and 4), but the gist of it: the king asks his three bodyguards to each write a sentence, and whoever's is the wisest sentence will be greatly rewarded.

3:10 The first wrote, “Wine is the strongest.” 11 The second wrote, “The king is strongest.” 12 The third wrote, “Women are strongest: but above all things Truth beareth away the victory.”

The one who says wine is strongest is our cynic, the one who says the king is strongest is our rationalist, the one who says truth is strongest is our believer.
Again, I'm not saying that this was Tarkovsky's inspiration for the Writer/Scientist/Stalker character set, I've just found this a fascinating subject ever since I realized how often this intellectual structure appears in various forms.

Tarkovsky polaroid archive: http://www.diphotos.net/JJ/Tarkovskij/Web/li.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

If Kubrick was the one who showed me the world of actual and art-based filmmaking, then it was Andrei Tarkovsky who demonstrated that the cinema can be provide apotheosis much in the same way ikons do. (For the record, Carl Theodor Dreyer and Robert Bresson are also in this category too.)

Admittedly I've not seen his entire oeuvre: only Ivanovo detstvo, Andrey Rublyov, Solyaris and Zerkalo. But what I have seen, I really enjoyed and particularly Andrey Rublyov. This was a man who I felt wanted to go both deeper in the images and deeper in what the images can say. In this sense, I see him as a "cinematic ikonographer" where light exposed onto celluloid can be used to convey something deeper and more profound much like how an ikonographer uses egg tempera and wood to illustrate the faith.

djproject wrote:Admittedly I've not seen his entire oeuvre: only Ivanovo detstvo, Andrey Rublyov, Solyaris and Zerkalo.

See Stalker and The Sacrifice, and prepare to have your mind blown.

I'm trying to locate the SFI (Swedish Film Institute) Region 2 PAL DVD of The Sacrifice. All that I can find via Google (as well as contacting SFI and Nostalghia.com) is the Kino and Artifical Eye releases. Anyone know of a source for this disc?

thanks

Seems to be out of print.

marnum wrote:Seems to be out of print.

Yeah, I saw that. Can't figure out how to email them though.

It says "Utgått! Går ej längre att köpa." meaning "Out of print. Can no longer be bought." And I'm afraid it's the same with any swedish site or shop.

Wasn't sure exactly where to post this - Michal Leszczylowski, the film editor of Tarkovsky's The Sacrifice as well as the Ullmann/Bergman Private Confessions and a few Lukas Moodysson films, was interviewed in an article posted today about the Japanese earthquake/tsunami disaster and resultant nuclear crisis:

"I'm not scared," said Michal Leszczylowski, a professor of film at the Stockholm Academy of Dramatic Arts in Tokyo to work on a project. "The real crime is the way the media is showing only the worst part. People think Japan all looks like the tsunami zone and it doesn't."

From The Digital Bits:

Kino Lorber has set Salt of the Sea for DVD release on 6/7, followed by Korkoro on DVD only on 6/14. They also have The Romantic Englishwoman and Priest of Love on Blu-ray and DVD on 6/21, followed by The Sacrifice: Remastered Edition on both formats on 6/28.

Wonderful! More than two years since we read that blog entry by Bret Wood. Now it finally has a date.

Finally! I was introducing my brother to Tarkovsky about two years ago and when he asked to borrow The Sacrifice I had to say: "Well, it's currently being restored and I'm waiting for the Blu-ray to own it, which might be another year or so." He gave me this weird look as though that is not something that normal people do.

This will be hard to beat as blu-ray/release of the year, and it's only three months away!

As excited as I am for the Tarkovsky I am even more excited for the left field announcement of The Romantic Englishwoman

mteller wrote:From The Digital Bits:

Kino Lorber has set Salt of the Sea for DVD release on 6/7, followed by Korkoro on DVD only on 6/14. They also have The Romantic Englishwoman and Priest of Love on Blu-ray and DVD on 6/21, followed by The Sacrifice: Remastered Edition on both formats on 6/28.

I am stoked about this news as much as any other fan of this movie for the same reasons. I probably would never have paid money or picked up for free any Kino DVD, but after seeing what they've done with Metropolis...

As an aside, one part I don't get about the film is that scene where the character runs naked down the hall and a goose follows after her. Kind of reminds me of the story Tarkovksy told in Sculpting in Time where he tossed a goose in front of the camera during The Raid in Rublev, but here, I thought it was kind of silly. Any help?

lol

A Blu-ray of "The Mirror" was released in Russia by "Krupniy Plan" a few days ago. Some screen grabs compared to the various DVD releases are available here.

Judging from the screen grabs, it is an improvement over DVD but the image is too soft and the color scheme is off to my eye. Also it appears cropped on top and bottom of the frame, but with some additional information to the right side.
The monochrome sequences are rendered as black-and-white, contrary to the previous DVD incarnations.

Still, glad to see it coming to Blu!

Pink sky again! This just isn't right. Praying that Kino don't just port this master over for theirs.

To my eyes, that doesn't look very impressive. Not especially sharper, maybe some digital smoothing, maybe just up-rezzed? Certainly not a patch on the clarity of a decent 35mm print of the film.

Boo: Субтитры Нет

Peacock wrote:Pink sky again! This just isn't right.

Seriously, looking at it... it does look right to me. If it was shot either in early morning or evening, the color would match (it's the pink on her white dress that makes me wonder if it was boosted a bit though).

Rublev blu-ray looks to have been re-released. Not yet available on kniga.ru. Also not clear if it still has English subs.

I'm not sure if this has been previously reported but yesterday I received my copy of Andrei Tarkovsky: A Photographic Chronicle of the Making of The Sacrifice, a book which contains over two hundred photos from the set of The Sacrifice. Required viewing for Tarkovsky fans. I took a few pics of the book here

I've just started reading ANDREI TARKOVSKY: THE COLLECTOR OF DREAMS by Layla Alexander-Garrett and it's fascinating stuff, though marred with the most curious recurring misprint I've ever seen.
Every word ending in “ture” has that part missing. Thus future becomes fu, nature becomes na and rapture becomes rap.
I haven't read much yet but it seems Layla really doesn't like Tarkovsky's wife...