Tags
Language
Tags
March 2024
Su Mo Tu We Th Fr Sa
25 26 27 28 29 1 2
3 4 5 6 7 8 9
10 11 12 13 14 15 16
17 18 19 20 21 22 23
24 25 26 27 28 29 30
31 1 2 3 4 5 6

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Posted By: alexov85
Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1 (2008)
Elgar (1962); The Debussy Film (1965); Always on Sunday (1965)

DVD9(Cust.) | English + Russian | 720x480 | Mpeg2, ~4052 kbps | AC3, ~192 kbps | 7.64 GB
Subs: English | Art-house, Drama, Documentary

He is perhaps the most criminally underrated great director of all time. He's earned an Oscar nom, and more early career accolades than many attempting his craft. But thanks to a late in life clash with commerciality, and a stern sense of self-importance, Ken Russell now stands as a pseudo-joke. He remains a great champion of his own Englishness, and has often used unusual platforms (Celebrity Big Brother in the UK, for example) to keep his reputation exposed and intact. What many fail to realize however is that there is much more to his legacy than Lair of the White Worm, or the Who's Tommy, or naked wrestling (look it up). Indeed, at one time, no one tackled the artist biopic with more flair and verve than he.

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Thankfully, the digital format is now allowing everyone an opportunity to see this early Russell at work - and if anyone ever doubted it before, Ken Russell at the BBC argues for a director of unfathomable ability and timeless talent. It's one of the year's best sets.

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Elgar (1962)

Plot: A partly dramatised account of the life of Sir Edward Elgar classical composer. Huw Wheldon narrates the life story over backdrops of beautiful mountain scenery, especially memorable is the image of young Elgar riding his horse around Malvern Hills.
Review: To hear the tale the way Russell tells it, Elgar's rollercoaster ride to eventual success had many more valleys than hills. Using a clever, nickelodeon like production style, the director drives us through many of the musician's earliest setbacks, leading up to the moment when "Pomp and Circumstance" becomes a kind of second anthem for World War I. A lot of figures featured by Russell exist between the uneasy years of 1890 and 1920, with a move from the Victorian age into the Industrial and the pre-conflict years shaping many a muse. Elgar came to hate his place as a proto-patriot, and we get wonderful illustrations of his growing displeasure with the way his work was treated. As an introduction to Russell's style, Elgar is excellent. When paired up with the next film in the set, we get a clear overview of the filmmaker circa the mid '60s.

IMDB info
Stars: Huw Wheldon, Peter Brett, Rowena Gregory
Production land: UK
Run time: ~54 min
NTSC 4:3

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1



Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

The Debussy Film (1965)

Plot: A group of actors follow their daring director as he tries to make sense of Claude Debussy's life.
Review: Clearly influenced by Fellini and the classic 81/2, Russell reconfigured the Debussy story as a commentary on actors, onset romances, and the hedonist attraction to art and artists. Oliver Reed, who will show up again as Rossetti in Dante's Inferno, is fantastic as the composer, using his obvious sexual swagger to suggest all manner of pent up emotions and ideas. The main theme that many of these films explore centers on the lack of success, the inability to gain sponsorship, and the various addictions that derive from same. As with many of his subjects, Russell appears very interested in the idea of lust, from both a personal and professional angle. Much of Debussy also finds the fictional director Vladek Sheybal bedhopping with Reed's various conquests, the fame whoring element of said women front and center. It makes for a wonderfully dense and delightful experience.

IMDB info
Stars: Oliver Reed, Vladek Sheybal, Annette Robertson
Production land: UK
Run time: ~82 min
NTSC 4:3

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1



Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Always on Sunday (1965)

Plot: After the death of his wife, former civil servant Henri Rousseau takes up painting full time.
Review: Coming across as a rarified boob, Russell's version of Rousseau could best be described as an accidental master. Most of his canvases are crackpot versions of reality as seen through the eyes of a naïve painter, and his loneliness and lack of worldly perspective really amplifies his applied amateurishness. Russell treats this tale as sadly comic, and there are many jokes and jibes as Rousseau's expense. In fact, there is such a lighthearted atmosphere here that when we finally view the artist's best known masterpiece - "The Sleeping Gypsy" - it comes as quite a shock. Indeed, many of Russell's films purposely demystify the legendary, showing them just as capable of flaws and foibles as us mere humans. Indeed, as he continued on in his career, the filmmaker would make such an approach his main raison d'etra. Much of his work here can be seen as the basis for Women in Love, Tommy, and his ultimate classical rock god goof, Listzomania.

IMDB info
Stars: Oliver Reed, James Lloyd, Annette Robertson
Production land: UK
Run time: ~41 min
NTSC 4:3

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1

Ken Russell at the BBC, Disc 1