'World Cinema Project Vol. 4’ Review: Films Outside Our Frame
David Mermelstein 09/24/2022This boxed set of Blu-rays and DVDS, curated by Martin Scorsese and distributed by the Criterion Collection, contains six recently restored foreign-language films, forgotten or unknown beyond their native countries.
At a time when world news seems especially grim and the divisions between people appear to outnumber their similarities, it’s a gift to savor the latest installment on disc from the World Cinema Project, a venture established in 2007. Curated by Martin Scorsese and distributed by the Criterion Collection, these boxes—the new one is volume four—house six films on nine discs, with each movie included on both Blu-ray and standard-definition DVD to maximize options for viewers.
All the films (none in English) are recently restored to best possible effect, generally in 2K or 4K, with the present set yielding particularly impressive results. The funding for such costly, time-consuming work comes primarily from Mr. Scorsese’s own Film Foundation, though several other cinema-loving charities also make generous contributions. These efforts either return lost treasures to public consciousness or reveal works hitherto unknown beyond the borders of their native lands—some from as long ago as the 1930s, others made as recently as the last decade of the 20th century.
Scene from ‘Prisioneros de la Tierra’ (1939) PHOTO: CRITERION COLLECTION
“Prisioneros de la Tierra” (1939), the earliest picture in this set, is directed by the Italian-born Mario Soffici, its script adapted from short stories by the ill-fated Horacio Quiroga, born and bred in Uruguay. But the film is thoroughly Argentine, a classic Latin melodrama in which the villain, Köhner (Francisco Petrone), meets a cruel but fitting end, even as the central lovers, Chinita (Elisa Galvé) and Podeley (Ángel Magaña, sort of an Argentine Pedro Armendáriz), confront undeservedly tragic fates. What makes the film special, besides the caliber of its principal players and its exotic jungle setting (shot on location rather than in a studio), is Soffici’s keen eye for cinematic detail, from the Beethoven records Köhner plays to soothe his savage breast to the often intoxicated ministrations of Chinita’s dolorous doctor father.
Scene from ‘Two Girls on the Street’ (1939) PHOTO: CRITERION COLLECTION
Released just a few months later, the Hungarian “Two Girls on the Street” (1939) lays several claims to interest—not least its director, whom fans of old Hollywood know as André de Toth (“House of Wax,” “Pitfall”). Here, before his trans-Atlantic transformation, he is Tóth Endre, already a gifted stylist with a penchant for daring overhead shots. Yet this film’s strong proto-feminist stance, in which two young women seek new, urban lives in Budapest while regularly battling loutish men, proves its biggest draw. Well, that and its documentary depiction of the sparkling Hungarian capital before wartime devastation. Only the abrupt “happy” ending disappoints.
A scene from ‘Muna Moto’ (1975) PHOTO: CRITERION COLLECTION
Two African films—“Sambizanga” (1972), from Angola, and “Muna Moto” (1975), from Cameroon—provide fresh views of that continent’s cinematic accomplishments. The former, the only picture in this box directed by a woman, Sarah Maldoror, offers a harrowing tale in Portuguese and two Bantu languages of a man torn from his village by colonial forces during the unrest that later leads to his nation’s independence. The movie’s divided focus concentrates not just on the sufferings of the imprisoned man, but even more so on those of his valiant wife. The latter, written and directed by Dikongué-Pipa, bends narrative perspective in novel ways to craft a bitter monochromatic fantasia, in French, in which a young man is cheated of true love not just by his selfish, greedy uncle, but also by the tribal society in which he lives.
Ironically, the movie that bridges the greatest distance is this set’s most recent: Mohammad Reza Aslani’s “Chess of the Wind” (1976), from Iran. That’s partly because the picture seems to take place a very long time ago (specifics are left vague), but even more so because the world represented in Mr. Aslani’s film was essentially erased in 1979 by his country’s Islamic revolution.
Happenstance alone saved this movie from oblivion, and how lucky we are for it—a moody tale of ugly family and class dynamics, reminiscent of Edgar Allan Poe, complete with an utterly unexpected, numbing final shot.
Scene from ‘Chess of the Wind’ (1976) PHOTO: CRITERION COLLECTION
The longest film in the box, at just over 2 1/2 hours, is also arguably the most important. “Kalpana” (1948), the Hindi word for imagination. Written, produced and directed by the celebrated Indian dancer Uday Shankar (elder brother of the renowned sitarist and composer Ravi Shankar), it documents his life’s work—and, loosely, his life story—in a spectacle of melodrama, fantasy, social realism, romance and politics. And, yes, he is also its star. Yet so accomplished is the effort—with tableaux inspired by Sergei Eisenstein and Fritz Lang—that it’s hard to believe this was Shankar’s first movie. It was also, sadly for us, his last.
Short, lively introductions to each film by Mr. Scorsese enhance this set, as do varied supplements that should not be overlooked. The real treasures, of course, are the films themselves—guaranteed to enrich any cineaste’s perspective. Currently the World Cinema Project has preserved 50 films, of which 32 are now available on Criterion discs—most, but not all, in these sets. And Mr. Scorsese and his collaborators are forging ahead, rescuing other important but neglected pictures, so this list will grow. We can only hope Criterion will continue to take it from there.
Mr. Mermelstein writes for the Journal on film and classical music.
The Wall Street Journal