Lost in the Stars Blu-ray

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S E A R C H D V D B e a v e r

Directed by Daniel Mann
USA 1974

Alan Paton's world famous novel of racial oppression, Cry the Beloved Country is transformed into a tragic and beautiful film musical unlike any you've ever seen. Gilded by Kurt Weill's (The Threepenny Opera) powerful music and lucid lyrics by Maxwell Anderson, and guided by Daniel Mann's (Playing for Time) sensitive direction, this one-of-a-kind film is both a heartbreaking indictment of a cruel society and a poetic testament to the millions of forgotten lives ground beneath the heel of apartheid. Brock Peters (To Kill a Mockingbird) is a black South African minister searching the unfamiliar urban alleys and shanty towns of Johannesburg for his missing son.

***

Lost in the Stars was an American Film Theatre adaptation of the musical play by Maxwell Anderson and Kurt Weill--which in turn was based on the Alain Paton novel Cry the Beloved Country. Brock Peters portrays a South African minister who goes to the Big City to locate his son Raymond St. Jacques, who is now a criminal in the eyes of the white rulers. The minister forges a curious, foredoomed friendship with a white farmer (Paul Rogers). Lost in the Stars has sometimes been accused of blunting the edge of Paton's angry study of the cruelties of Apartheid; fans of musical theatre will be more politely inclined to this loving filmization of the Broadway play. On its own, Cry the Beloved Country was previously filmed in 1951, with Canada Lee, Sidney Poitier and Charles Carson.

Excerpt from B+N located HERE

Posters

Theatrical Release: April 8th, 1974

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Review: Kino - Region 'A' - Blu-ray

Box Cover		CLICK to order from:
Distribution	Kino - Region 'A' - Blu-ray
Runtime	1:37:34.515
Video	1.85:1 1080P Dual-layered Blu-ray Disc Size: 33,775,948,977 bytes Feature: 25,867,232,832 bytes Video Bitrate: 31.99 Mbps Codec: MPEG-4 AVC Video
	NOTE: The Vertical axis represents the bits transferred per second. The Horizontal is the time in minutes.
Bitrate Blu-ray:
Audio	LPCM Audio English 1536 kbps 2.0 / 48 kHz / 1536 kbps / 16-bit
Subtitles	English, None
Features	Release Information: Studio: Kino 1.85:1 1080P Dual-layered Blu-ray Disc Size: 33,775,948,977 bytes Feature: 25,867,232,832 bytes Video Bitrate: 31.99 Mbps Codec: MPEG-4 AVC Video Edition Details: • Interview with Edie Landau (26:16) Ely Landau: In Front of the Camera, a promotional film for the American Film Theatre (06:30) Gallery of trailers for the American Film Theatre Blu-ray Release Date: June 25th, 2019 Standard Blu-ray Case Chapters 12

Comments:

NOTE: The below Blu-ray captures were taken directly from the Blu-ray disc.

ADDITION: Kino Blu-ray (June 2019): Kino Lorber now release the American Film Theatre's presentation of "Lost in the Stars" on Blu-ray. This is the 1974 film version of the Kurt Weill-Maxwell Anderson musical adaptation of the Alan Paton novel 'Cry, the Beloved Country'. The dual-layered disc features the 1-hour-37-minute film with a high bitrate. Grain is rather heavy and thick, with a nice amount of detail showing through. The decent contrast levels really shine in the more dramatically lit scenes in prison and during the dance sequence at the bar. A fine transfer, welcome addition to 1080p HD Blu-ray.

The real power of this adaption is the music/lyrics of Kurt Weill and Maxwell Anderson. Thankfully, Kino Lorber give us the film with an uncompressed 2.0 linear PCM audio, albeit in 16-bit. The music really shines here. Dialogue and finer sounds are intelligible, though I can imagine that a 24-bit track could be a little cleaner. There are optional English SDH subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing on this Region 'A' Blu-ray from Kino.

As with the other American Film Theatre releases from Kino, the only extras here are a 26-minute interview with Edie Landau, a 6-minute promo for the AFT, and a gallery of trailers for the AFT.

Kino continues to impress, with their releases of American Film Theatre presentations on Blu-ray. I would recommend this Blu-ray to fans of theatre, especially musical theatre and Kurt Weill. Powerful stuff.!