Almanac of Fall - Bela Tarr

(aka "Autumn Almanac" or "Öszi almanach" )

Hungary 1985

In his first three films Bela Tarr--conceivably the most important Eastern European filmmaker currently working--betrays an impatience with cinematic style, focusing almost exclusively on content, but that tendency was radically overturned with this 1984 feature, whose taste and intelligence are specifically (and exquisitely) cinematic and revealed Tarr as a master stylist. Set entirely in an apartment inhabited by an elderly woman, her son, his former teacher, the old woman's nurse, and the nurse's lover, the film consists mainly of intense two-part dialogues and encounters largely concerned with the old woman's money. The remarkable use of color depends on a lighting scheme that divides most areas (and characters) into blue and orange, and the elaborately choreographed mise en scene is consistently inventive and unpredictable, making use of highly unorthodox angles and very slow camera movements. As in Damnation (1987), the mise en scene often seems to be composed in counterpoint to the action, but the drama itself (whose Strindbergian power and sexual conflicts are realized with an intensity and concentration that suggests John Cassavetes) carries plenty of charge on its own.

Jonathan Rosenbaum (From the Chicago Reader )

Theatrical Release: 17 January 1985

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DVD Comparison:

Facets - Region 0 - NTSC vs. Artificial Eye - Region 2 - PAL

Big thanks to Arvid for the Facets Review! Big thanks to Per-Olof Strandberg for Artificial Eye Review

(Facets - Region 0 - NTSC LEFT vs. Artificial Eye - Region 2 - PAL RIGHT)

DVD Box Cover
Distribution	Facets Region 0 - NTSC	Curzon Artificial Eye Region 2 - PAL
Runtime	1:55:09	1:55:09 (4% PAL speedup)
Video	1.78:1 Original Aspect Ratio 16X9 enhanced Average Bitrate: 4.37 mb/s NTSC 720x480 29.97 f/s	1.66:1 Original Aspect Ratio Average Bitrate: mb/s PAL 720x576 25.00 f/s
	NOTE: The Vertical axis represents the bits transferred per second. The Horizontal is the time in minutes.
Bitrate: Facets
Audio	Hungarian Dolby Digital 2.0	Hungarian Dolby Digital 2.0
Subtitles	English (non-removable)	English, None
Features	Release Information: Studio: Facets Aspect Ratio: Widescreen anamorphic - 1.78:1 Edition Details: • Cine-Notes collectible booklet DVD Release Date: 2006-07-25 Keepcase Chapters 17	Release Information: Studio: Curzon Artificial Eye Aspect Ratio: Widescreen letterboxed - 1.1:66 Edition Details: • None DVD Release Date: Mar 14th 2016 Transparent keep-case Chapters 12

Comments

ADDITION: Artificial Eye - February 2017: Before I bought this, I tried to find some technical information of Béla Tarr’s Autumn Almanac DVD released in 2016 by Curzon Artificial Eye. I couldn’t find any. A shame, because I would have never bought it - in this condition.

There’s two positive things with these DVD, it seems to be the sharpest of the three, and it’s in the correct 1.66:1 aspect ratio and the subtitles are removable. That’s it. The disc occupies 6,16 GB of space, on a dual-layered disc, and it’s region 2 (and 8) in the PAL format.

Who would have thought that a DVD released in 2016 is in 4:3 letter-boxed format (non-anamorphic), and in a quite awful quality. This is definite a disc that gives new meaning for films watched on iPhone, or a tablet. It can’t be seen in much bigger size with all the issues. In the later part of the disc, there’s a light bar on the left side on the picture for quite long time. Maybe a transfer error.

The audio is like those DVD’s made in 1998, with a lot of hiss and crack’s. The sound is probably from an old 35 mm used cinema copy.

Seriously, Artificial Eye, you need to hire someone to be in charge for the quality control for your digital releases. This is not something you sell for full price in 2017. We remember also the troubled Tarkovsky Blu-rays from 2016.

There’s no extra material on the disc.

- Per-Olof Strandberg

***

As usual with Facets we get a DVD5 (3.71GB) and burned-in subtitles. But for once they have made a decent transfer, compared to the first three films they released (Family Nest, The Outsider & Prefab People) this actually looks quite good. From what I heard this release have been supervised by Tarr himself. There is another DVD release of this film by the French company Clavis films, I don't know if it's better than this one but it's possible. it's said to have optional subs in English (plus French, German and Dutch I think). One thing I'm not sure about is the aspect ratio. It looks quite good but I think 1.66:1 would be more likely to be the OAR, if anyone knows for sure please drop a email.

- Arvid

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Facets - Region 0 - NTSC

Artificial Eye - Region 2 - PAL

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