Zu den beiden bereits im März genannten Filmen von Maurice Pialat, die Masters of Cinema nun am 24. August 2009 auf DVD veröffentlicht, habe ich bisher noch nicht die Ausstattungsdetails genannt. Dies hole ich hiermit nach.

24. August 2009
DVD #73: “Wir werden nicht zusammen alt / Nous ne vieillirons pas ensemble / We Won’t Grow Old Together” [F / I 1972, Maurice Pialat]

Jean (Jean Yanne) and Catherine (Marlène Jobert) are a couple whose every move charts an advancement deeper into an emotional warzone. Theirs is the classic and the tragic case of an emotional abuse centred around a perplexing, but powerful, interdependency. As the moment approaches wherein the relationship can no longer perpetuate its cycle of weekend holidays, apologies, and submissions, Maurice Pialat discloses all the ways in which the future might be at once liberated, and enslaved, by the past.

Based on a novel by Pialat himself, and on the trauma of his own personal life in the years leading up to the film, Nous ne vieillirons pas ensemble was a smash-hit at the time of its release, and retains its power up to the present day. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present Pialat’s second feature masterpiece for the first time on DVD in the UK.

• New anamorphic transfer of the film in its original 1.66:1 aspect ratio
• New and improved optional English subtitle translations
• La Camargue (1966) – a short film by Maurice Pialat [6:00]
• 2003 interview with actress Marlène Jobert [19:00]
• 1972 interviews with Pialat and Jean Yanne, including two scenes deleted from the film [5:00]
• 1972 interview with François Truffaut about Pialat’s films [8:00]
• 1972 conversation between Pialat and associates about the film [12:00]
• Original trailer for Nous ne vieillirons pas ensemble, plus six more
• 32-PAGE BOOKLET containing a new essay by critic Emmanuel Burdeau, and newly translated interviews with Maurice Pialat

24. August 2009
DVD #75: “Mach erst mal Abitur / Passe ton bac d’abord” [F / CDN 1979, Maurice Pialat]

The world sometimes seems divided into two camps: those who recall their teenage years as having been an exhilarating dream, and those who remember them as having been an infernal, nightmarish hell. So it might do to describe Passe ton bac d’abord… [Graduate First… / Pass Your Bac First…] as Maurice Pialat’s “The Best Years of Our Lives”, while bearing in mind all that such a description might suggest: an unsparing portrait of the era when the words ‘sixteen candles’ still might have first conjured the image of flames.

A group of young actors including several local unknowns – Philippe Marlaud, Bernard Tronczyk, Patrick Lepczynski, and Sabine Haudepin (once the little girl of Truffaut’s Jules et Jim), among others – make up the cluster of friends adrift beneath the twilight of their school years. There’s drama, violence, and pot-induced laughs – group holidays, indiscriminate sex, advances from teachers twenty-five years their seniors, attempted moves to Paris, and few prospects of passing the bac, the final set of exams French students take before embarking into the world to… do what?

Marking the last work of Pialat’s turbulent cycle of films made in the 1970s, Passe ton bac d’abord… is the brilliant spiritual sequel to the great filmmaker’s feature-debut L’Enfance-nue – with the action taking place in the same region as the earlier film, ten years on. The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present Pialat’s teenage drama in a beautiful new transfer for the first time on home video in the UK.

• New anamorphic transfer of the film in its original 1.66:1 aspect ratio
• New and improved optional English subtitle translations
• A 2003 video interview with Pialat collaborators Arlette Langmann and Patrick Grandperret, made by Serge Toubiana (former editor-in-chief of Cahiers du cinéma and director of the Cinémathèque Française) [11:00]
• Après le bac [After the Bac] a 2003 documentary by Serge Toubiana and Sonia Buchman that catches up with the cast and location [26:00]
• Original trailer for the film, and trailers for the six other Maurice Pialat features available from The Masters of Cinema Series
• Booklet containing newly translated interviews with Maurice Pialat + more