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Having tackled the corrupting nature of power with Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion and taken an angry, impassioned look at labour relations with The Working Class Goes to Heaven, Italian master Elio Petri next turned his attentions to capitalism for the darkly comic Property is No Longer a Theft.

A young bank clerk (Flavio Bucci, the blind pianist in Dario Argento’s Suspiria), denied a loan by his employer, decides to exact his revenge the local butcher (Ugo Tognazzi, La Grande bouffe) who is not only a nasty, violent, greedy piece of work but also one of the bank’s star customers. Quitting his job, the clerk devotes all of his time tormenting the butcher, stealing his possessions one-by-one, including his mistress (Daria Nicolodi, Deep Red).

Told in an off-kilter fashion by Petri, abetted by the woozy sound design and another outstanding score by Ennio Morricone, Property is No Longer a Theft presents a caustic, blackly comic look at a corrupt society.

SPECIAL EDITION CONTENTS:

4K restoration from the original film negative
High Definition Blu-ray (1080p) and Standard Definition DVD presentations
New subtitle translation
Brand-new interview with actor Flavio Bucci
Brand-new interview with producer Claudio Mancini
Brand-new interview with make-up artist Pierantonio Mecacci
Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Nathanael Marsh

FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Illustrated collector’s booklet containing new writing on the film by Camilla Zamboni

Now this is fucking awesome. Fantastic news!

Any idea if some of Petri's more obscure films tied up with rights issues (i.e. The Working Class Goes to Heaven, Todo Modo)?

Looking forward to checking this out; loved Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion, still need to pick up the Arrow Blu-Ray of L'assassino.

criterion10 wrote:Any idea if some of Petri's more obscure films tied up with rights issues (i.e. The Working Class Goes to Heaven, Todo Modo)?

THE WORKING CLASS GOES TO HEAVEN is out in Italy from Raro Video on DVD with Eng subs (& a bilingual booklet), so conceivably might also be released by Raro Video USA...

While TODO MODO was recently restored (in 2014) by the Cineteca di Bologna and the Museo Nazionale del Cinema di Torino in collaboration with Surf Film & Warner Bros & in association with The Film Foundation, with the contribution of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association and The Film Foundation, the work performed in the laboratorio L'Immagine Ritrovata di Bologna (the resulting Surf DVD however has no Eng subs)... Trailer of that resto posted by the Cineteca here...

criterion10 wrote:Any idea if some of Petri's more obscure films tied up with rights issues (i.e. The Working Class Goes to Heaven, Todo Modo)?

Looking forward to checking this out; loved Investigation of a Citizen Above Suspicion, still need to pick up the Arrow Blu-Ray of L'assassino.

Waiting for Criterion to port that over here as well (since it's a Columbia title apparently, so they shouldn't have much trouble with UK rights).

I was hoping for more Petri so this is welcome news. Would love to see some more Rosi show up later in the year as well!

ellipsis7 wrote:

criterion10 wrote:Any idea if some of Petri's more obscure films tied up with rights issues (i.e. The Working Class Goes to Heaven, Todo Modo)?

While TODO MODO was recently restored (in 2014) by the Cineteca di Bologna and the Museo Nazionale del Cinema di Torino in collaboration with Surf Film & Warner Bros & in association with The Film Foundation, with the contribution of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association and The Film Foundation, the work performed in the laboratorio L'Immagine Ritrovata di Bologna (the resulting Surf DVD however has no Eng subs)... Trailer of that resto posted by the Cineteca here...

A company called Kinoglazorama had intentions to release it worldwide, which hasn't happened. When I asked them last year if they were still going to, their response was: "We will. We are working on a new strategy to avoid distribution fees and try to create something different to sell our products."

I still don't know what that means.

Arrow tried to get the UK rights when the restoration was premiered back in 2014, but they'd already been snapped up - presumably by Kinoglazorama.

rapta wrote: Waiting for Criterion to port that over here as well (since it's a Columbia title apparently, so they shouldn't have much trouble with UK rights).

I was hoping for more Petri so this is welcome news. Would love to see some more Rosi show up later in the year as well!

I'm most interested in seeing some more Dino Risi on blu-ray (after il Sorpasso), don't know about UK rights, but looks like Janus has distribution rights to I mostri and Rialto has Una vita difficile. Sure wish I lived in NYC right now to catch MOMA's Retrospective.

I mostri needs a good release. Italian DVD is poor quality, French DVD is a from a different cut.

I think i mostri has got an extra or 'just discovered" episode (s), it was shown in Bologna (I think it was Bologna).
Una vita difficile, that marvellous masterpiece, restored. Wow.

I received my copy a few days ago, and while I didn't have the time yet to watch it, I had a look at the restoration credits and saw that "all restoration work was carried out at L'immagine Ritrovata Bologna".
And guess what ? It now has almost the same look that every other Bologna restoration (only slightly less yellow) : http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film6/blu-ray_ ... lu-ray.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Yuck! It's like these companies don't want my money!

Have there been any other releases of the film on disc that might help demonstrate what the original look of the film was?

It's an even more unfortunate situation with a movie this comparatively obscure, in that this is the only real way now to see it (don't want to support this kind of monkeying with the image, but also am curious to see the film anyways).

tenia wrote:I received my copy a few days ago, and while I didn't have the time yet to watch it, I had a look at the restoration credits and saw that "all restoration work was carried out at L'immagine Ritrovata Bologna".
And guess what ? It now has almost the same look that every other Bologna restoration (only slightly less yellow) : http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film6/blu-ray_ ... lu-ray.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The caps look beautiful.

tenia wrote:I received my copy a few days ago, and while I didn't have the time yet to watch it, I had a look at the restoration credits and saw that "all restoration work was carried out at L'immagine Ritrovata Bologna".
And guess what ? It now has almost the same look that every other Bologna restoration (only slightly less yellow) : http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film6/blu-ray_ ... lu-ray.htm" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

I watched it all the way through and I think it has some of the same issues as the Solange release sadly. Like there's a colour or two missing. Admittedly I'm not an expert on these two films but they don't feel right especially with black levels and wood tones.