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This Sporting Life



One of the finest British films ever made, this benchmark of "kitchen-sink realism" follows the self-defeating professional and romantic pursuits of a miner turned rugby player eking out an existence in drab Yorkshire. With an astonishing, raging performance by a young Richard Harris, an equally blistering turn by fellow Oscar nominee Rachel Roberts as the widow with whom he lodges, and electrifying direction by Lindsay Anderson, in his feature-film debut following years of documentary work, This Sporting Life remains a dramatic powerhouse.

Special Features

• New, restored high-definition digital transfer
• Audio commentary featuring Paul Ryan, editor of Never Apologise: The Collected Writings of Lindsay Anderson, and David Storey, screenwriter and author of This Sporting Life
• Theatrical trailer
• Lindsay Anderson: Lucky Man? (2004, 30 min), a documentary from BBC Scotland featuring interviews with many of the director's close friends and collaborators
• New video interview with Lois Sutcliffe Smith, Anderson's close friend and president of the Lindsay Anderson Memorial Foundation
• Meet the Pioneers (1948), Lindsay Anderson's first documentary short
• Wakefield Express (1952), Anderson's short-film contribution to England's Free Cinema series, shot in the same town that served as the location for This Sporting Life
• Is That All There Is? (1992, 50 min), Anderson's autobiographical, final film

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This Sporting Life is Sony property and If... is Paramount's. I really thought Criterion would be able to release this.

I thought the CC This Sporting Life rumor even came straight from CC.

It could be that Sony Repertory is just the distributor for theatrical prints. It doesn't necessarily follow that they own the video rights to the film.

For what it's worth, TCM showed This Sporting Life recently, and it didn't have ANY logos at the start. Their print immediately jumped into the main titles.

I recall the Image disc had a Janus Films logo on it. The actual disc, that is.

tryavna wrote:For what it's worth, TCM showed This Sporting Life recently

And I didn't know about it until I ran across it w/ maybe 5 minutes left. I've never seen it and I've been kicking my own ass regularly since.

Polybius wrote:

tryavna wrote:For what it's worth, TCM showed This Sporting Life recently

And I didn't know about it until I ran across it w/ maybe 5 minutes left. I've never seen it and I've been kicking my own ass regularly since.

Why don't you just rent the DVD from Netflix? They list as being available.

If that turns out to be a mislead, it's not that hard to find in terrestrial video stores.

Criterion did release this on laserdisc with a nice looking print so maybe they can get the rights back and release it in dvd?

Lindsay Anderson is a sorely neglected master. Besides This Sporting Life, If..., and O, Lucky Man! there's the sublime The White Bus, The Singing Lesson, and his last film Is That All There Is?

Brittania Hospital and The Whales of August are both uneven, but worthwhile (especially the former.) Plus there's the film of In Celebration that he made for Ely Landau.

A massive volume of his writings on film has just been published, and there's also Gavin Lambert's Mostly About Lindsay Anderson.

My life is divided into "Before If..." and "After If. . ."

I was fortunate enough to have met him (at the cast and crew screening of My Own Private Idaho of all places) and told him how much his work has meant to me.

Network appear to be releasing a R2 DVD on 24/07. Fingers crossed for a remastered transfer...

atcolomb wrote:Criterion did release this on laserdisc with a nice looking print so maybe they can get the rights back and release it in dvd?

Rumors are that they are working on this currently.

justeleblanc wrote:

atcolomb wrote:Criterion did release this on laserdisc with a nice looking print so maybe they can get the rights back and release it in dvd?

Rumors are that they are working on this currently.

Great News!...

BBC Radio 2 have been broadcasting a series called, Angry, Sexy and Working Class and last week's programme focused on This Sporting Life and it was very good.

Click on "listen again"

Direct confirmation of a Criterion release:

[quote="Criterion"]Lethem Picks His Favorites
On Monday, October 15, the Brooklyn Academy of Music's BAMcinématek will introduce a series of films entitled “Jonathan Lethem Selects,â€

Fantastic. I'm glad the UK release that was due for September got pushed back or I'd probably have wasted my cash on it, I'm guessing it was probably just a reissue of one of the older discs anyway.

Great news. I hope Mike Kaplan and Malcolm McDowell's new feature-length documentary NEVER APOLOGIZE: A PERSONAL VISIT WITH LINDSAY ANDERSON (which was at Cannes and is having its North American premiere at AFI fest in a few weeks) shows up on this disc.

Nice to see a classic British new wave film this getting a release in the collection.

What a great extra in Is That All There Is?!

Will all this fit on one disc?

denti alligator wrote:Will all this fit on one disc?

its a 2 disc set.

kaujot wrote:What a great extra in Is That All There Is?!

His best film, imho.

GringoTex wrote:

kaujot wrote:What a great extra in Is That All There Is?!

His best film, imho.

I've been waiting for ages to see it.

So glad that this package has some meat on its bones, unlike If.... As much as I love that movie, I don't think I'd watch anything on the disc beyond the feature itself again (outside of a few of McDowell's comments on the commentary). Anways, it's a great time to be a Lindsay Anderson fan after such a long drought with regards to DVD releases.

Wow, Wakefield Express too.. This is looking like a bit of a treat, seeing as I'm fortunate enough to have been born and bred in that grim part of the world.