Product Description
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A young actress, Ethel, coming from nowhere, is trying to create
a personality through her body and her indestructible resolve if
necessary, through Elena, her lover's wife who has disappeared.
Two men: Lucas Kesling, ambitious cinema director with diabolical
powers, and Milan, fallen angel on an earth cracking beneath his
feet, both fighting to possess Ethel. The restless filming of a
viscontian movie adapted from Dostoyevsky's "The Possessed" in an
opulent and smothering set. A political conspiracy conspiring to
do away with the prelate from Eastern Europe, which Milan is
inadvertently caught up in. An oppressing and eerie Paris
transformed into an expressionist universe which these hunted
characters are trying to escape from.
These are essential elements of La Femme Publique (The Public
Woman), Andrzej Zulawksi's 6th film, where the obsessive themes
of his dazzling career Trzecia Czesc Nocy (The Third Part of the
Night,1971), L'Important C'est D'er (The Important Thing is to
Love,1975), and Possession (1981) become entangled.
ANDRZEJ ZULAWSKI's La Femme Publique is a cinematic milestone
rich with extreme imagery and raw emotions. Twenty five years
after its controversial inception at the Cannes Film Festival,
this story of a young, struggling actress retains the power to
shock even the most seasoned of movie goers with its violently
stylish, apocalyptic tone. A woman s destiny, divided between
angel and demon...An hour and 54 minutes of painful happiness, La
Femme Publique scratches the soul, slaps the eyes, and seduces
like the maelstrom that each one of us hides beyond the
conscious. To summarize La Femme Publique is impossible,
dangerous and impoverishing. Zulawski is not a man of words; he
plays and juggles with the image, the color, the rhythm, the
sound, the music, and this unspeakable shamelessness that he
steals from his actors so effectively. Between humor and
paroxysm, La Femme Publique is a fascinating metaphysical
experience with a degree of intensity that needs to be seen to be
believed. Simply put, it represents cinema at its most insane &
brilliant.
- Special Screening & Mention @ 1984 Cannes Film Festival
AWARDS:
-Montréal World Film Festival:
Most Popular Film Of The Festival
Special Prize of the Jury
NOMINATIONS:
César Awards, France
Best Actress: Valérie Kaprisky
Best Supporting Actor: Lambert Wilson
Best Writing Adaptation: Andrzej Zulawski
Best Writing Adaptation: Dominique Garnier
DVD CONTENTS:
MONDO VISION presents the first ever North American release of
Andrzej Zulawski's highly anticipated and sought after film La
Femme Publique (The Public Woman, 1984) in a gorgeous transfer
with all new English Subtitles, UNCUT & Fully Uncensored.
Disc 1: The Film
* Digitally Restored Transfer Mastered In High Definition
Progressive Scan (Approved by Director Andrzej Zulawski)
* Feature Length Audio Commentary With Director Andrzej Zulawski
And Writer Daniel Bird
* Exclusive New Video Interview With Director Andrzej Zulawski
* Theatrical Trailer
* DVD-ROM Content
* Image Gallery
Disc 2: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack CD (Exclusive To
Limited Edition. 32 tracks CD Digitally remastered in Paris under
the supervision of Composer Alain Wisniak) [Available for the
first time ever on CD]
+ Exclusive 48pg Commemorative booklet including a newly written
essay by Daniel Bird + Rare & Inful Interviews With Andrzej
Zulawski and the Cast [retranslated and published for the first
time ever in English]
* INTERVIEW with Andrzej ZULAWSKI (Feb, 1984)
* INTERVIEW with Francis HUSTER (Feb, 1984)
* INTERVIEW with Valérie KAPRISKY (Feb, 1984)
* INTERVIEW with Lambert WILSON (Feb, 1984)
* "Music Of Apocalypse:" An Interview With ANDRZEJ ZULAWSKI
[Originally Appeared In The French Film Magazine Cinéma, May 1984
(N°305)]
* "A Filmmaker Has To Be Disruptive...":An Interview With ANDRZEJ
ZULAWSKI [Originally appeared In The French French film Magazine
La Revue Du Cinéma, May 1984 (N°394)]
+ 10 B&W Reproductions Of The Original Japanese Publicity Photos
+ Certificate of Authenticity With Unique Serial # [Only 2000
Individually Numbered Sets Produced]
TECHNICAL NOTES:
Le Femme Publique is presented in its original aspect ratio of
1.66:1 and original Mono French soundtrack as intended by Andrzej
Zulawski. This Dual Layer disc has been transferred and encoded
using a high-frequency process which preserves as much of the
detail and texture from the original film as is possible on the
NTSC DVD format.
UPC: 837654024645
Catalog#: MVLE001
Review
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Like the theatrical milieu of L' important C'est D'er (The
Important Thing Is To Love, 1975), this depiction of passionate
complications during the making of a film vibrates with actorly
trauma, romantic angst and shrieking conflicts of ego. Bly
utilizing distanciation techniques as if they were his personal
contribution to the language of film, Zulawski gives De Palma a
run for his money in the realm of reflexive cheek. What he adds
to the panoply of Nouvelle Vague motifs on display is a
consistent ability to wring intense performances from his casts;
here, Kaprisky and Huster belt out their antagonistic tirades
with blistering energy.
The crystal clear, blue-tinged photography of Possession (1981)
- such an inspiration to Argento as he embarked on Tenebrae - is
replaced here by burnt orange and wood-glow tones, courtesy of
the incomparable Sacha Vierny (famed for his marvelous work on
Last Year In Marienbad, and now the regular collaborator of Peter
Greenaway).
Existing in a highly excited state of over-stimulation,
Zulawski's characters have to shout and scream to be heard over
the ferocious buzz of a culture hypostatized in a convulsive urge
to depict, represent, speak.
Compared to Zulawski, many filmmakers are still playing "Buy A
Broom". --Excerpts from a review by Stephen Thrower, ©EYEBALL
Magazine, Issue .4, Winter 1996
Trzecia Czesc Nocy (The Third Part of the Night, 1971), L'
Important C'est D'er (The Important Thing Is To Love, 1975),
Possession (1981), and now this new cataclysmic poem of a
blossomed Polish director, who is also maybe rootless, in France.
Far from the constraining bureaucracies but very close to this
panic, to this fantasy, that rejoins the collective unconscious.
La Femme Publique (The Public Woman), like Zulawski's other
movies, is an essential film. A very contemporary story, that
reminisces of the eternal myths! --Excerpt from a review by
Gilles Gressard, 1984
Zulawski is a mortal enemy of rational, measured filmmaking.
Excess is the key to each scene. The actors all seem afflicted
with St. Vitus' Dance, the camera too. Characters don t converse
as much as rant, they don t interact, but collide. Copulation,
brutality and murders are everyday activities.... Zulawski's
vision of the world is and sordid. --(Variety)