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dwk wrote: Wed Apr 15, 2020 5:30 pm Interesting to note that this does not have an updated DVD coming alongside the Blu-ray.

movielocke wrote: Wed Apr 15, 2020 6:26 pm I think it probably has to do with sales numbers and projected sales numbers, they don’t expect to ever break even on the cost of a dvd printing. Salesman also did not get a dvd upgrade.

swo17 wrote: Wed Apr 15, 2020 4:58 pm July 21

swo17 wrote: Mon Jul 20, 2020 4:45 pm It's one of my favorites as well but it's also just a guy driving around the whole time, and then an ending that doesn't make any sense. I wouldn't go in expecting to be "excited"

Tommaso wrote: Mon Jul 20, 2020 11:26 pm

swo17 wrote: Mon Jul 20, 2020 4:45 pm It's one of my favorites as well but it's also just a guy driving around the whole time, and then an ending that doesn't make any sense. I wouldn't go in expecting to be "excited"

It was the first Kiarostami I ever saw, and it almost managed to turn me off from a director who I now consider to be one of the greatest filmmakers of all time. Having seen all his other films since then, getting more of a context, the ending now seems less awful to me than the first time around, but I still find it pretty much forced (and unlike in "Through the Olive Trees" or "Certified Copy" its reflection on the artificiality of the film-making process definitely hasn't been prepared in the plot of the film itself). I guess I'm pretty much in the minority, but I wouldn't rank "Taste of Cherry" anywhere near the top of his works, though it is probably one of the most accessible to general European 'arthouse' audiences/ festival circuits. But for me it simply lacks the very personal, deeply emotional touch of a film like "Where's the friend's home", or the radical experimental approach of something like "Shirin" or "24 Frames", all of which I find endlessly more rewarding and thought-provoking. As for "a guy driving around the whole time", "Ten" is the one to watch, of course.

His video installation based round the traditional Iranian drama TAZIYEH, which depicts the martyrdom of the Imam Hossain, is played out in mannered fashion (the bad guy dressed in red, the good in green, an actor appearing in lion costume, and copious rich red paint doubling for blood). This drama he places on a central plasma screen, but as it is played out, we simultaneously watch above on two large projected screens, images of the ordinary men and woman in the Iranian audience. Kiarostami has cited the influence of the TAZIYEH (rather than Brecht) on his use of distancing techniques in his cinema, but in the installation we also see a remarkable and pure manifestation of Aristotleian dramatic progression, as registered on the faces of the audience, through from initial engagement and mimesis, to emotional upset and catharsis. We see them chatter and drinking tea, then their growing interest and identification, fast followed by silence and rapt attention, developing finally into anguish and tears. It was simple but stunning.

domino harvey wrote: Tue Jul 21, 2020 5:48 am I'd go with Close-Up