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Being released on December 5, according to the Arrow Video Store. DVD only.

That's great news. Can you post a link? I can't seem to find it.

Awesome! I ordered the Czech DVD once but it never ended up shipping. Libuše Šafránková is a domino avatar waiting to happen.

swo17 wrote:I ordered the Czech DVD once but it never ended up shipping.

I think the Czech DVD looks awful. Too bad no Blu-ray but nevertheless looking forward to this edition.

L.A. wrote:Three Wishes for Cinderella (1973) coming to Blu-ray next month. English subs according to the site and interesting extras as well.

C'mon, Second Run... [-o<

I saw this film... gosh, seventeen years ago and loved it. Definite pre-order for me.

Having grown up with two sisters, I've watched this on TV almost every Christmas eve as far back as I can remember. I've seen it probably 25 times, and will no doubt see it again this year, so I'm in no rush to get it on DVD. I'm curious why they specify that they're presenting it "in its original full-length version" though. Is this often shown in a truncated version?

No we just meant rather than the 'cut-up-into-episodes' version that played on British TV in the 1970s.

In the 1970s, this was shown on BBC 1's 'Tales from Europe', in 3 or 4 installments, with Gabriel Wolf's(?) narration laid over the original dialogue,
which was still audible in the background.

The same basic-yet-utterly-charming approach was used on several of these bought-in films, like 'The Singing Ringing Tree'.
It's how these films first came to be known to UK viewers as children and, to my mind, it adds considerably to the magic.
Happily, Network's DVD of 'The Singing Ringing Tree' included the BBC's original English voice-over track.

There's a version of 'Three Wishes for Cinderella' currently on YouTube, that has the English voice-over track, as well as the endearingly-clumsy
still-inserts that concealed the Czechoslovakian titles.

Is there any chance of locating this, and including it on the release?

And it's such a visually sumptuous film, is there any likelihood of a UK BD release?

There's already a German BD of this (the film was a Czechoslovakian/East German co-production).

It's 7.99 Euros on Amazon.de - no English subtitles, but German ones, and it's in two aspects, 16:9 and 4:3.

Its German title is 'Drei Haselnüsse für Aschenbrödel'.

Ged Parsons wrote:And it's such a visually sumptuous film, is there any likelihood of a UK BD release?

None whatsoever: I've already asked them directly.

And their reasoning is perfectly sound: while the film may have a humungous cult following in its two countries of origin (and elsewhere in Europe; it's big in Norway as well), it's almost entirely unknown in the UK, and it's also not the kind of film that appeals overmuch to film buffs. So a British BD would be a substantial commercial risk in a way that it clearly wouldn't be in Germany or the Czech Republic.

MichaelB wrote:

Ged Parsons wrote:And it's such a visually sumptuous film, is there any likelihood of a UK BD release?

None whatsoever: I've already asked them directly.

And their reasoning is perfectly sound: while the film may have a humungous cult following in its two countries of origin (and elsewhere in Europe; it's big in Norway as well), it's almost entirely unknown in the UK, and it's also not the kind of film that appeals overmuch to film buffs. So a British BD would be a substantial commercial risk in a way that it clearly wouldn't be in Germany or the Czech Republic.

Sorry, but by 'them' do you mean Second Run?

Too bad, but I understand the reasoning.

I do. I'm working on an extra, so I needed to know upfront whether it would be HD or SD

An extra examining the use of fairy tales in Eastern European film would be very interesting.

AidanKing wrote:An extra examining the use of fairy tales in Eastern European film would be very interesting.

Your wish is my command (oh the irony) - that's precisely what I'm working on right now!

Although I'm sticking to Czech film and very occasional mentions of Soviet titles rather than eastern European film in general, as there wasn't much of a fairytale tradition in other eastern European cinemas, at least as far as I can make out. Certainly not one as indelibly embedded in the culture as it was in Czechoslovakia, where half the top ten box office hits for the whole of the 1950s were fairytales, including the first four, and the top two may be the biggest homegrown Czech blockbusters ever - now that our viewing is much more fragmented, it's hard to imagine anything else selling eight million tickets domestically, as Bořivoj Zeman's The Proud Princess did in 1952. Two decades later, Three Wishes for Cinderella was the biggest blockbuster of 1973 by almost a 100% margin.

That sounds enormously interesting and I suspect and hope that it might result in some additional sales.

I suppose there's also the issue of fairy/folk tale motifs in other films such as Valerie and her Week of Wonders and (perhaps) Morgiana. Those two titles also make me think of the fact that, despite the outwardly (and understandably given the milieu in which they are set) conservative nature of fairy tales, they often feature female characters with much more agency than many films set in the present, particularly current Hollywood blockbusters. Of course, one of the selling points of this version of Cinderella is that it looks as if there are some significant feminist aspects in its approach.

That is indeed one of its strong points, and it will duly be highlighted. Cinderella is infuriatingly passive in most adaptations - even her good fortune is driven by the fairy godmother rather than her own initiative, and has a supernatural deadline attached - but the treatment here is very different. Which I suspect is one of the reasons why it's so popular.

MichaelB wrote:

AidanKing wrote:An extra examining the use of fairy tales in Eastern European film would be very interesting.

Your wish is my command (oh the irony) - that's precisely what I'm working on right now!

Although I'm sticking to Czech film and very occasional mentions of Soviet titles rather than eastern European film in general, as there wasn't much of a fairytale tradition in other eastern European cinemas, at least as far as I can make out. Certainly not one as indelibly embedded in the culture as it was in Czechoslovakia, where half the top ten box office hits for the whole of the 1950s were fairytales, including the first four, and the top two may be the biggest homegrown Czech blockbusters ever - now that our viewing is much more fragmented, it's hard to imagine anything else selling eight million tickets domestically, as Bořivoj Zeman's The Proud Princess did in 1952. Two decades later, Three Wishes for Cinderella was the biggest blockbuster of 1973 by almost a 100% margin.

Romanian cinema certainly had a fair few fairy tale films, most notably the films of Elisabeta Bostan. Her more famous films are still shown every Easter in Romania and still much loved.
Her early films share many similarities with the Soviet era films, though of course this is not a huge surprise given Romania's cultural proximity to the USSR at the time.

There is a box-set containing Seven of her films available, but it seems there are no English subtitles. I have this set so I should really check if they have subs, as I have come across a few Romanian DVD that actually have subtitles not listed on the boxes. On original release, some of these films were dubbed into English by international distributors, and some of these versions still exist in rips from VHS sources.

These films are beautiful to look at, not always the case with communist Romanian films, I've had no problem sitting through some of these films on TV at Easter with a very poor understanding of Romanian.

I'm working my way through Jack Zipes' massive The Enchanted Screen, which doesn't appear to mention her - which is curious, as it's otherwise admirably internationalist in its outlook.

But I'll see if I can squeeze in a mention of my own - thanks for the tip-off.

If memory serves me, Tinerete Fara Batranete is probably the most comparable to the Soviet and Czech films of the era. There's a reasonable rip on youtube too.

And here's an extract from my 32-minute video piece:

https://vimeo.com/191159063" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;