Made in Italy

By Christopher P. Jacobs
Movies Editor

Two very different classic films shot in Italy in the early 1960s have just gotten the BluRay treatment. Italian auteur Michelangelo Antonioni’s subtle and poetic tale of alienation, “Red Desert” (1964) came out from Criterion late last month, and stop-motion animator Ray Harryhausen’s iconic adventure-fantasy “Jason and the Argonauts” (1963) just came out last Tuesday from Sony.

Red Desert

“Red Desert” (“Il Deserto Rosso”) was Antonioni’s first film in color, made immediately after his widely acclaimed trilogy “L’Avventura” (1960), “La Notte” (1961), and “L’Eclisse” (1962). Like those three films, it features the enigmatic Monica Vitti and moodily explores a woman’s sense of alienation, less through plot and action than through careful character placement in the environment and image composition on the screen. The addition of color gave Antonioni one more element over which he could exert complete control to reflect the film’s themes, and he used it like a master painter.

In “Red Desert” Antonioni’s themes go beyond individual and personal feelings of isolation to look at the effect of modern industrialization and technology upon nature – including both natural human interaction and the natural landscape humans must live in and co-exist with. The formal, almost abstract architectural beauty of man-made structures contrasts with trees, sky, rocks, and mist. Ability to adapt to change (or not) is yet another theme that comes out. The eerily timely depiction of industrial pollution contrasts strikingly with the bedtime story of a girl on a pristine deserted island with crystal-clear water.

As typical of Antonioni, the pacing may seem a bit slow to American audiences and the progression of plot development differs substantially from the standard Hollywood formula. Characters and situations can be read allegorically and metaphorically, and frequent ambiguity allows multiple interpretations. The imagery is the film’s strong point and key to understanding much of what is going on – on a variety of different levels.

Criterion’s HD transfer is outstanding, and the mono sound is also very good. The selection of supplementary features meets Criterion’s usual high standard, giving greater insight into both the film and Antonioni as a director. Besides a trailer, there’s a very good audio commentary, interviews with Antonioni and Vitti, a half-hour of unedited dailies, two early documentary shorts made by Antonioni in the 1940s (though one is unfortunately copied from a very poor quality print), and an excellent 44-page booklet with a critical essay, an interview with Antonioni done by French director Jean-Luc Godard, data on the film and transfer, and many color frame enlargements.

“RED DESERT” on BluRay – Movie: A- / Video: A / Audio: A- / Extras: A

Jason and the Argonauts

“Jason and the Argonauts” ranks among the best of the modestly budgeted family-friendly adventures inspired by ancient Greek mythology and was successfully re-released theatrically a decade after it was made. Although taking quite a few liberties with the original myths, the film presents a solid foundation in the ancient world, its beliefs, and its heroic stories. This one is based loosely on “The Argonautica,” an ancient tale of an even more ancient journey with distinct echoes of Homer’s “Odyssey” but working in a variety of other myths and legends, particularly the quest to find the magical “golden fleece.”

American special-effects wizard Ray Harryhausen produced the film in Britain and shot on location in southern Italy, achieving amazing production values for his small budget. The largely British veteran cast helps a great deal, although the script never really fleshes out the characters. The film’s highlights are Harryhausen’s ground-breaking incorporation of animated puppet creatures interacting with the human actors decades before the days of computer imagery. Even more amazing is the fact that Harryhausen planned the effects and did all the animation by himself, including the memorable swordfight against seven vengeful skeletons.

The film’s imaginative escapism and vivid visual fantasy sequences had a huge impact on budding young filmmakers who grew up in the 1960s and 70s, inspiring many of today’s noted directors to choose their career path in film. Among these is Peter Jackson, who, along with modern visual effects artist Randal Cook, provides one of the disc’s two excellent audio commentaries. The other commentary features the now 90-year-old Harryhausen himself with British film historian Tony Dalton.

Sony had issued a nice four-disc BluRay set of key 1950s Harryhausen titles, but the beautiful hi-def transfer on “Jason” surpasses those by far. Picture quality ranges from good to very good to downright superb, depending upon the scene and use of optical effects. In the 1960s, all optical effects had to be duplicated to a new piece of film, from which a new negative was made to insert into the film at the proper spot. Harryhausen’s trademark “Dynamation” scenes were achieved by photographing his models frame by frame in front of a screen displaying a frame-by-frame rear projection of the live-action footage. These techniques naturally resulted in a somewhat grainier image than all the non-effects scenes that could be printed directly from the camera negative. Copies on VHS tapes could not really show much difference, and DVDs barely hinted at it, but the BluRay reproduces exactly what would have been seen in theatres running 35mm film prints.

The BluRay of “Jason and the Argonauts” has a decently remixed 5.1 stereo soundtrack as well as the original mono. Besides the two great audio commentaries, the extras include original storyboards for the spectacular skeleton fight, and bonus features ported over from the previous DVD versions (all in standard-definition), including two good documentaries on Harryhausen and a very nice little interview that director John Landis did with him about “Jason.” There are also several hi-def trailers including three of other Harryhausen titles available on BluRay.

“JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS” on BluRay – Movie: A- / Video: A / Audio: A / Extras: A

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