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Tabu



In 1929, F. W. Murnau (Nosferatu, Faust, Sunrise), one of the greatest of all film directors, invited leading documentarist Robert Flaherty (Nanook of the North, Man of Aran) to collaborate on a film to be be shot on location in Tahiti, a Polynesian idyll in which Murnau imagined a cast of island actors would provide a new form of authentic drama and offer rare insight into their "primitive" culture. The result of their collaboration was Tabu, a film that depicts the details of indigenous island life to tell a mythical tale that is rich in the universal themes of desire and loss.

Subtitled "A Story of the South Seas", Tabu concerns a Tahitian fisherman (played by an islander, Matahi) and his love for a young woman (played by fellow islander Reri, who went on to star on Broadway) whose body has been consecrated to the gods, rendering her tabu as far as mortal men are concerned. The lovers flee their island and its restrictive traditions, but will their love prevail in the "civilised" world?

This Oscar-winning film (the Academy Award went to cinematographer Floyd Crosby) is both poetic and simple in tone. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present - completely uncensored and fully restored - this landmark film of rare exoticism and magical beauty, described by critic Lotte Eisner in 1931 as "the apogee of the art of the silent film", for the first time ever on Blu-ray in its original aspect ratio.

SPECIAL FEATURES

• New 1080p HD transfer on the Blu-ray of the Murnau-Stiftung/Luciano Berriatúa 75th anniversary restoration of the pre-Paramount, longer Murnau-approved version of the film, with uncensored scenes and titlecards, appearing in its original 1.19:1 aspect ratio for the first time
• Full-length commentary track by R. Dixon Smith and Brad Stevens.
• 15-minute German documentary about Tabu by Luciano Berriatúa.
• Newly presented outtakes from the original shoot of the film.
• Treibjagd in der Südsee (short subject from 1940 depicting a South Seas fishing hunt, created from unused material from the filming of Tabu)
• 56-PAGE BOOKLET containing writing by Murnau, Scott Eyman, David Flaherty, and Mark Langer & Floyd Crosby, along with "A Song for Mr. Murnau" and rare imagery.

Milestone's release is very pleasing, especially considering how old the DVD itself is. However, it's considerably cropped. The MoC release will no doubt be an improvement.

davidhare wrote:The only nudity you'll see on the island is obese female German tourists with unwisely chosen body piercings sunbathing topless to the dismay of the locals, and me for that matter.)

They probably steal your sun-lounger by placing their towels on it at 6am, too I bet.

Gordon wrote:

davidhare wrote:The only nudity you'll see on the island is obese female German tourists with unwisely chosen body piercings sunbathing topless to the dismay of the locals, and me for that matter.)

They probably steal your sun-lounger by placing their towels on it at 6am, too I bet.

Why not just hide the towels and enjoy the use of your sun-lounger? If they come to argue, feign ignorance of whatever language they use.

Sold my Image edition of this last week in excited anticipation of the MOC, after viewing it just one more time of course. I really love this film. Not a bad commentary with good extras on that R1. Any word on how MOC will compare. As you can see, I have such faith in you guys that I sell before even asking! Is there any chance that you folks will be addressing that jitter that haunts the other edition so frequently?

Peerpee: Is this still planned as a 2-disc set? Can you reveal any of the treats we'll findon the second disc?

Yowza!

Wowsers!

MovieMail lists this with a single disc price tag, for a November 19 release.

What A Disgrace wrote:MovieMail lists this with a single disc price tag, for a November 19 release.

Is that reliable? We were all so looking forward to a jam-packed double disc edition...

Then again I can't imagine there's a lot of extra material to put on the Der Letzte Mann release so maybe the Murnau specific stuff has been passed onto that?

And these extras again sound pretty incredible to me! It also seems it is a single disc, considering the price tag. Very reasonable.

DVD Times lists the book at 96 pages (!). MoC's DVDs are starting to feel like free gifts for buying their books. I can't think of a better way to reward people who actually spend money on the titles.

The books in EDVARD MUNCH, TABU, NOSFERATU, and all the Mizoguchi twinpacks will be 80-pages.

pre-order @ HMV for £11.99

I'm just a little surprised at one thing (I had my fingers crossed based on the "More features TBA!" thing up top at the initial entry for the thread here), which is that the issue of all those many hours of outtakes and documentation have been excluded for this release. I was hoping this would fulfill the long-wished-for by scholars Ultimate Edition of the film, which is one of the best documented of the silent era via the endless numbers of outtakes, alternate takes, deleted material, and footage on the set. Nick, do you know if the Murnau foundation made this material available, or is it still being held in UCLA perhaps? There are all those photographs-- plus a bunch of stuff on set and in the bungalows between two of the greatest visual artists of the past 100 years, Matisse (who visited Murnau on the set & lived there for a time while production went on, and went to see the film in Paris almost every week I believe, helping inaugurate his "Tahiti phase" of cutouts etc.) A deep-study edition of this film, i.e. say, a branched edition with links to alternate takes (say by pushing the angle button or something along what was done w/TAXI DRIVER w/the script by navigating via a special menu feature) on a scene by scene basis, has been a longing for years. The Milestone has a goodly chunk of some of this material and much of it is fascinating... I guess the Milestone combined with the MoC will have to comprise the best picture we can get of the production of this film.

I'm also a little surprised that MoC didn't manage to get all the alternate footage that was available on the Milestone disc, including early footage shot by Flaherty. Was there a rights issue of some sort? Or is that material being held off for any eventual Flaherty boxset that we've talked about from time to time.

At any rate, I had been assuming that the MoC would render the Milestone entirely irrelevant. But that doesn't seem to be the case. I'll be hanging on to the Milestone for its valuable extras. Though, of course, I'm greatly looking forward to the improved -- and uncropped -- image of the MoC.

MoC trailer at YouTube (the YouTube encoding is pretty crap, though). The Quicktime trailer at the MoC Series site will look a lot dandier, but I currently can't get the thing lower than 80MB.

Pretty gorgeous large frame Quicktime trailer now at the MoC Series site (it's 80MB though).

Hilarious review:

"The fact that the story is told silent when exotic song, birds and the wash of waves could have enhanced the soundtrack, can be brought to bear on the film could have been improved. Less avoidable is the lack of colour that the film screams of, partly due to the absence of the occupying richnesses of sound. "

and:

"In Tarzan And His Mate, sound brings the tropics expressway to us. In Tabu, the silence distances us."

It's clearly a meticulously-researched piece, what with its reference to the Criterion edition...

Tell him how much you share his love of adverbs:

Paul Higson - is returning to film writing after an absence of 10 years stockpiling the literary new for the big break. He was the editor of Bleeder's Digest and contributed to many other quaint paper-set small press publications. His abattoir play Swine was staged in Derby by No Half Measures Theatre Company of Derby, and a novel nears completion. Abuse and opprobrium is welcome via: [email protected]

peerpee wrote:Hilarious review:

"The fact that the story is told silent when exotic song, birds and the wash of waves could have enhanced the soundtrack, can be brought to bear on the film could have been improved. Less avoidable is the lack of colour that the film screams of, partly due to the absence of the occupying richnesses of sound. "

and:

"In Tarzan And His Mate, sound brings the tropics expressway to us. In Tabu, the silence distances us."

hahahahahahahahahaha (rising from floor, attempting to regain decorum) I guess he prefers the 80s version of THE BLUE LAGOON