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Numero Trois wrote:

Zot! wrote:a much more economical approach to collecting Truffaut's films, if you don't need the Criterion supplements.

...or the latter Doinel films, which lean decidedly to the lightweight if not downright forgettable

The spellbinding lightweight-ness of Stolen Kisses is anything but forgettable, especially when Delphine Seyrig is onscreen.

I saw all 4 Doinel films for the first time at Austin Film Society this year. I really, really enjoyed both Stolen Kisses & Bed And Board. They're quite different in tone to The 400 Blows, but were very funny. I enjoyed the appearance of the blustery American from Parade as Doinel's boss in Bed And Board. Love On The Run, on the other hand...(although I did enjoy the theme song).

Artificial Eye has provided additional details for the individual Truffaut releases.



Stolen Kisses - street date August 25th

Special Features:

• Presentation of the film by critic Serge Toubiana
  Audio Commentary by actress Claude Jade and screenwriter Claude De Givray
  An appeal by Truffaut and Godard for French Cinema

The Soft Skin - street date August 25th

Special Features:

• Presentation of the film by Serge Toubiana
  Audio Commentary by Jean- Louis Richard
  Original Theatrical Trailer

Bed & Board - street date September 15th

Special Features:

• Presentation of the film by critic Serge Toubiana
  Audio Commentary with actress Claude Jade and screenwriter Claude De Givray
  'Antoine & Collette' - A 32 minute short film by Francois Truffaut
  Presentation of the short film by critic Serge Toubiana
  Audio Commentary of the short film by Marie-France Pisier
  Original theatrical trailer

Anne and Muriel - street date September 15th

Special Features:

• Presentation of the film by critic Serge Toubiana
  Audio Commentary by screenwriter Jean Gruault
  Original Theatrical Trailer

A Gorgeous Girl Like Me - street date September 15th

Special Features:

• Short Film: Les Mistons (The Mischief Makers)
  Presentation of the short film by critic Serge Toubiana
  Audio Commentary on the short film by Claude De Givray
  Theatrical Trailer

GaryC wrote:

manicsounds wrote:Interesting, the Truffaut BDs have optional English subs, according to the menu caps.

Confirmed, from the DVD checkdiscs received today.

A little more detail on this, based on the BD checkdisc I have received for The Four Hundred Blows. The film is on the disc as two separate titles: one with subtitles for the film, the other with the commentary soundtrack and subtitles for the commentary. Both sets of subtitles are optional, but what you can't do (if you wanted to) is to listen to the commentary and have the film subtitles on.

GaryC wrote:A little more detail on this, based on the BD checkdisc I have received for The Four Hundred Blows. The film is on the disc as two separate titles: one with subtitles for the film, the other with the commentary soundtrack and subtitles for the commentary. Both sets of subtitles are optional, but what you can't do (if you wanted to) is to listen to the commentary and have the film subtitles on.

That's just mental - what possible contractual rationale could there be for that?

The BFI's Red Desert shows how to do this sort of thing properly - both soundtracks and subtitles are completely mix-and-match, so you can watch the commentary with the subtitles on, or play the film soundtrack with the commentary presented as a text track.

I'm assuming that it's not possible to switch soundtracks and subtitles on the fly via the remote?

MichaelB wrote: I'm assuming that it's not possible to switch soundtracks and subtitles on the fly via the remote?

From Gary's description, it sounds like there's two separate .m2ts files on the disc - one with the actual audio track for the film an one with the commentary - so mixing and matching, even via remote, wouldn't be possible in that case as they would be in a different stream.

If I understand correctly, doesn't that mean the film is on the disc twice, thus taking up twice as much space as is required (or more importantly, starving both files of a higher bitrate)? Sounds like a huge authoring flub.

EddieLarkin wrote:If I understand correctly, doesn't that mean the film is on the disc twice, thus taking up twice as much space as is required (or more importantly, starving both files of a higher bitrate)? Sounds like a huge authoring flub.

Absolutely : 2 files = twice the space taken (except if one video file is severely compress to let the other one breathe). Warner did it the same way for The postman always rings twice, taking there also twice the space.

It'd be fine if the encodes were done properly, but The Postman has a BD-50 poorly used and I assume that The 400 Blows is on a BD-25 as Jules and Jim and Shoot the piano player.

I've just looked at the files on the disc via my PC. There is one .m2ts file for the feature, which is 25.6GB in size (running time 99:39).

But to confirm, if you watch the film, the only subtitles available are those for the feature, which can be switched on and off via the remote. For the commentary, you have to select this from the extras menu. Then you get the commentary soundtrack with commentary subtitles, which can again be switched on and off via the remote. Other combinations (commentary track with feature subs, or vice versa) are not possible, at least not with my player.

Maybe an authoring trick which only allows, after a choice of the audio track in the menus, a certain set of subs ? It'd be the first time I see this.

I've seen this on a few other discs (I don't remember which ones specifically), where after making a certain menu selection the other audio and subtitle tracks show up as existing on the player, but they can't be switched to.

I remember flagging this up when QCing Arrow's The Key, whose subtitles and soundtracks couldn't be switched on the fly - but the disc producer explained to me that this was because there were three sets of very similar-looking but nonetheless different subtitles, namely:

• a translation of the Italian dialogue in the English soundtrack;
• the same, but with a transcription of the English dialogue and SDH sound cues as well;
• a translation of the Italian soundtrack.

...it was considered that making them switchable via the remote might need to needless confusion. And of course in that case there's no obvious rationale for mixing and matching the soundtracks and subtitles, as they're all clearly designed to work with specific counterparts and would be pretty meaningless otherwise.

But this wouldn't appear to be the case here - it should be obvious when you're playing soundtrack or commentary subtitles.

Why is "Story of Adele H" not included in AE's Truffaut Bly Ray collection?

It's MGM. None of those titles were included.

Mirroring contents of the French releases, British Artificial Eye has announced Francois Truffaut Blu-ray box sets.
Both will be available for purchase on November 24th.

THE ADVENTURES OF ANTOINE DOINEL: 5 FILMS BY FRANCOIS TRUFFAUT
Released as a 4 disc DVD (RRP £34.99) and 4 disc Blu-ray set (RRP £39.99)

THE 400 BLOWS
Presentation of the film by Serge Toubiana
Screen Tests
Commentary by Robert Lachenay
Trailer

STOLEN KISSES
Presentation of the film by Serge Toubiana
Commentary with actress Claude Jade and screenwrite Claude de Givray
An appeal by Truffaut and Godard for French Cinema
Trailer

BED & BOARD
Presentation of the film by critic Serge Toubiana
Commentary by actress Claude Jade and screenwriter Claude de Givray
Short Film: Antoine & Collette
Presentation of the short film by Serge Toubiana
Commentary of the short film by MF Pisier
Trailer

LOVE ON THE RUN
Presentation of the film by critic Serge Toubiana
Commentary with Marie-France Pisier
Trailer

THE FRANCOIS TRUFFAUT COLLECTION - 8 DISC SET
Released as an 8 disc DVD (RRP £59.99) and 8 disc Blu-ray set (RRP £69.99)

SHOOT THE PIANIST
Presentation of the film by Serge Toubiana
Commentary by cinematographer Raoul Coutard
Marie Doubois' screen tests
Trailer

JULES ET JIM
Presentation of the film by Serge Toubiana
Jeanne Moreau comments on the film
Trailer

THE SOFT SKIN
Presentation of the film by Serge Toubiana
Commentary with Jean- Louis Richard
Trailer

ANNE & MURIEL
Presentation of the film by Serge Toubiana
Commentary with screenwriter Jean Gruault
Trailer

A GORGEOUS GIRL LIKE ME
Short Film: Les Mistons
Presentation of the short film by Serge Toubiana
Commentary of the short film by Claude De Givray

THE LAST METRO
Presentation of the film by Serge Toubiana
Commentary with Gerard Depardieu and Film Historian Jean-Pierre Azema
Deleted Scene
Trailer

THE WOMAN NEXT DOOR
Presentation of the film by Serge Toubiana
Commentary by Veronique Silver
Fanny Ardant and Gerard Depardieu comment on key scenes
Trailer

FINALLY, SUNDAY
Presentation of the film by Serge Toubiana
Commentary by Jean-Louis Trintignant
Trailer

From blu-ray.com:

British distributors Artificial Eye/Curzon Film World have informed us that ther are planning to add a number of titles to their catalog in early 2015.
Amongst them are Andrey Zvyagintsev's Leviathan, Israel Horovitz's My Old Lady, and Denis Villeneuve's Enemy.

ARTIFICIAL EYE

12th Jan 2015
LEVIATHAN - DVD & Blu-ray

23rd Feb 2015
STILL LIFE (Uberto Pasolini) - DVD only

23rd March 2015
LA MAISON DE LA RADIO - DVD only


CURZON FILM WORLD

5th Jan 2015
LIFE OF CRIME - DVD & Blu-ray

26th Jan 2015
JIMI: ALL BY MY SIDE - DVD & Blu-ray

9th Feb 2015
ENEMY - DVD & Blu-ray

16th March 2015
MY OLD LADY - DVD & Blu-ray

What is the status of "Finally, Sunday"? Amazon has listed it as "temporarily out of stock" since its release date. I had pre-ordered it, and am still waiting. Does any other retailer have it?

Very disappointed that Still Life is only getting a DVD release. It's one of the very best films I have seen this year and thought it would be a shoe in for Blu Ray treatment.

Oh well, I just buy the Region 4 Australian release which is due out next month instead now.

Amazon says "we need more time to tell you when Au Hasard Balthazar will be available". I do not remember how many times this has been delayed, and why. And I do not understand why AE needs to wait till the weekend before the announced release date to tell us it aint going to be there.

kekid wrote:Amazon says "we need more time to tell you when Au Hasard Balthazar will be available". I do not remember how many times this has been delayed, and why. And I do not understand why AE needs to wait till the weekend before the announced release date to tell us it aint going to be there.

I'd love to know why it's been delayed so long. Mouchette was also massively delayed, and distinctly underwhelming when it finally appeared - the transfer was great, but it had fixed subtitles and the overdubbed German version of the making-of doc instead of the French original, drowning Bresson out seconds after he started to speak.

Amazon is saying March 23, 2015 for Au Hasard Balthazar now. Sheesh.

they're waiting to see if the donkey will get back up.

jheez wrote:Amazon is saying March 23, 2015 for Au Hasard Balthazar now. Sheesh.

March 23rd 2015 seems to be the graveyard date for delayed titles...BFI's Eyes Without A Face joining it now! Such a shame...looking forward to both. Will Lift to the Scaffold ever come out either?

In the UK at least, 2014 shall be remembered as 'year of delays' - Artificial Eye leading the pack, but Arrow, BFI and Network have all been pretty terrible at keeping original release dates. Eureka a few times but not by much, and most of all they keep in contact with their audience and don't end up delaying things by several months (or revising the date the week before release).