Import Export Blu-ray Ekateryna Rak Paul Hofmann

Search DVDBeaver

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

directed by Ulrich Seidl
Austria 2007

It’s cold and gray. Wintertime. People are freezing. That’s how it is here in Austria. That’s how it is there in the Ukraine. Two different worlds that are increasingly coming to resemble each other. The East looks like the West, the West like the East.

In this atmosphere two stories take place that at first glance appear unrelated. One is an import story. It begins in the Ukraine and leads to Austria. The other is an export story; it begins in Austria and ends in the Ukraine.

The first is about Olga, a young nurse and mother. Olga wants more from life. She wants to get out of the city, out of the country. She decides to go to Austria, which she does. In this foreign country in the West, she finds work and then loses it. She starts as a housekeeper and ends up a cleaning lady in a geriatric hospital.

Two individual fates, two opposite directions.

The other story is about Paul, a young Austrian. He finally lands a job as a security guard but gets fired almost immediately. He finds himself back at the Employment Office. He has debts and borrows more money, from friends, strangers and his stepfather, who takes him along on a job in the Ukraine setting up video gambling machines.

Olga and Paul. Both are looking for work, a new beginning, an existence, life: Olga, who comes from the Eastern part of Europe, where unremitting poverty is the order of the day. Paul, who comes from the Western part, where unemployment means not hunger, but a crisis of meaning and sense of uselessness. Both are struggling to believe in themselves, to find a meaning in life. In both the West and East. Both travel to a new country, and thus into its depths. IMPORT EXPORT deals with sex and death, living and dying, winners and losers, power and helplessness, and how to give the teeth of a stuffed fox a professional cleaning job.

Taken from Import Export website located HERE

Theatrical Release: France 21 May 2007 (Cannes Film Festival)

Reviews More Reviews DVD Reviews

Comparison:

Trinity - Region 2 - PAL vs. Palisades Tartan - Region 1 - NTSC vs. Trinity - Region FREE - Blu-ray

Big thanks to Per-Olof Strandberg for the Trinity DVD Review!

1) Trinity - Region 2 - PAL LEFT

2) Palisades Tartan - Region 1 - NTSC - MIDDLE

3) Trinity - Region FREE - Blu-ray RIGHT

DVD Box Cover

Distribution	Trinity Region 2 - PAL	Palisades - Tartan Region 1 - NTSC	Trinity Region FREE - Blu-ray
Runtime	2:15:32 (4% PAL speedup)	2:15:24	2:21:24.476
Video	1:1.78 Original Aspect Ratio 16X9 enhanced Average Bitrate: 4.24 mb/s PAL 720x576 25.00 f/s	1.78:1 Aspect Ratio 16X9 enhanced Average Bitrate: 5.71 mb/s NTSC 720x480 29.97 f/s	1080P / 23.976 fps Single-layered Blu-ray Disc Size: 20,159,203,406 bytes Feature: 17,899,112,448 bytes Video Bitrate: 14.00 Mbps Codec: MPEG-4 AVC Video
	NOTE: The Vertical axis represents the bits transferred per second. The Horizontal is the time in minutes.
Bitrate DVD Trinity
Bitrate DVD Tartan
Bitrate Blu-ray
Audio	German; Russian (Dolby Digital 5.1), German; Russian (Dolby Digital 2.0)	German; Russian (Dolby Digital 5.1), German; Russian (Dolby Digital 2.0), German; Russian (5.1 DTS Surround)	DTS-HD Master Audio German/Russian 1856 kbps 5.1 / 48 kHz / 1856 kbps / 16-bit (DTS Core: 5.1 / 48 kHz / 1509 kbps / 16-bit)
Subtitles	English (Forced)	English, none	English, none
Features	Release Information: Studio: Trinity Aspect Ratio: Widescreen anamorphic - 1:1.78 Edition Details: • Interview with Ulrich Seidel (23:09) • Trailer (1:51) DVD Release Date: January 26th, 2009 Keep Case Chapters 29	Release Information: Studio: Palisades Tartan Aspect Ratio: Widescreen anamorphic - 1:1.78 Edition Details: • Interview with Ulrich Seidel (6:03) • Interview cinematographer Edward Lachman (2:59) • Trailer and 6 Previews DVD Release Date: January 26th, 2010 Keep Case Chapters 25	Release Information: Studio: Trinity 1080P / 23.976 fps Single-layered Blu-ray Disc Size: 20,159,203,406 bytes Feature: 17,899,112,448 bytes Video Bitrate: 14.00 Mbps Codec: MPEG-4 AVC Video Edition Details: • Interview with Ulrich Seidel (24:08) • Trailer (1:50) Blu-ray Release Date: October 5th, 2009 Standard UK Blu-ray Case Chapters 29

Comments

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

ADDITION: Palisades Tartan - January 2010: Like Palisades Tartan's You the Living this release is also from an unconverted PAL source (see the running time) and has all the associated artifacts of that practice including 'ghosting' and 'combing' (see last SD capture below). Essentially it is a little hazier and a poorer transfer.

It does offer the DTS Surround, however I find that a minor consolation as compared to the video rendering. Supplementary there is a shorter, excerpted, interview with Ulrich Seidel for 6-minutes and 1/2 that with cinematographer Edward Lachman. There is also a theatrical trailer and 6 previews.

The Trinity PAL DVD is about half the price of the Palisades/Tartan at present and the Region FREE Trinity Blu-ray not far off even-up and that is the option we recommend for this memorable, and sad, film.

***

ADDITION: Trinity Blu-ray - September 09: Because the film was shot on 16mm we don't see the dramatic improvement in detail that we have seen with other SD vs. HD comparisons, but colors perk-up to a minor degree. You see more grain but it still tends to look quite blocky with artifacts till present - if to a lesser degree. As the image is not a demonstrative improvement, via the single layered Blu-ray disc with 3 times the bitrate, I'd say the superiority lies, beyond the higher resolution, in the fact that it is in NTSC (24 fps) running time, the more dynamic audio (DTS-HD Master - 1856 kbps) - which comes into play in a few key scenes - and that the subtitles are now removable. The 25-minute interview with Ulrich Seidel is duplicated - as is the theatrical trailer.

This impacting film deserves a wide audience and although I won't suggest an upgrade if you already own the DVD - I will lean to the Blu-ray for first time viewers. It's the best way to watch this daring, humanistic, verité expression. My Momitsu has identified my screener as being a region FREE disc playable on Blu-ray machines worldwide and we give the film our full endorsement.

Gary Tooze

***

ON THE DVD: Trinity Production (UK) offers Import / Export in the PAL format and coded for Region 2. The disc is dual layered, occupying 5.61 Gb of space. On my player the layer change made a long pause, in the beginning of a scene. That's almost the only disc fault that I noted.

Originally shot on Super 16 mm film negative, the DVD is a strong reproduction of it. The greenish colors are most probably intended. In some images (when the actors had dark clothes towards a bright background) there was minor edge enhancement visible.

There are two soundtracks available, Dolby Digital 2.0 and Dolby Digital 5.1. They are marked in the menu as Stereo and Surround Sound (like TV companies does). I listened to the DD 5.1 track and it was flawless, mostly using the front channels.

The English subtitles are, unfortunately, forced. On the extra material there's a 23 minute interview with the director plus a trailer.

- Per-Olof Strandberg

DVD Menus