Film Movement Classics Delivers Derek Jarman's Landmark EDWARD II in a Stunning, Digitally Restored Blu-ray
By: Macon Prickett May. 23, 2018
In 1593, Christopher Marlowe penned "Edward II," based on the life of Britain's only openly gay monarch. In 1991, legendary artist and director, Derek Jarman (Wittgenstein, Caravaggio) radically adapted the Elizabethan drama in a highly stylized feature starring Jarman muse and Oscar-winner Tilda Swinton and Steven Waddington. And, on June 12, Film Movement Classics delivers this iconoclastic New Queer Cinema landmark in a stunning digitally RESTORED version, available on Blu-ray for the very first time in North America.
Jarman's postmodern adaptation delivers filmgoers to the court of Plantagenet King Edward II (Waddington), a weak gay monarch with a tenuous grasp on the throne. The stage is set for palace REVOLT when the King rejects his wife, Queen Isabella (Swinton), and takes a male lover, the ambitious commoner Piers Gaveston (Andrew Tiernan) upon whom he bestows gifts and power. The spurned Queen and the sober court officials become enraged and the plotting begins in this festival favorite, a Golden Lion nominee at Venice, called "intelligent and striking[1]," and a "phantasmagoric, outrageously stylized interpretation[2]". With anachronistic imagery, gay activists battling riot police and a rare film appearance by Annie Lennox singing Cole Porter's 1944 classic "Ev'ry Time We Say Goodbye," the story of Edward and the persecution he suffered is given contemporary resonance in one of Jarman's most powerful and personal films.
Born in 1942, Derek Jarman worked as a stage designer before breaking into film as the production designer on Ken Russell's The Devils (1970). His directorial debut, the X-rated Sebastiane (1976), was a Latin-language homoerotic reimagining of the martyrdom of St. Sebastian, set in in a sunbaked Roman LEGION outpost. In addition to numerous short films and music videos, Jarman's other features include the biopics Caravaggio (1986) and Wittgenstein (1993), an adaptation of The Tempest (1979) and his final film, Blue (1993), a radical work of voiceover narration accompanying a single, saturated shot of blue, made when the filmmaker had all but lost his sight to AIDS-related complications. He died in 1994, at the age of 52.
CAST
Tilda Swinton (Isle of Dogs, Okja, Dr. Strange, Michael Clayton)
Steven Waddington (The Imitation Game, "The Tudors")
Andrew Tiernan (300: RISE of an Empire, Automata)
BONUS FEATURES
Documentary featurette Derek s Edward
Queenie Queens on Top - a new essay by filmmaker Bruce LaBruce, with a prologue by star Tilda Swinton
AWARDS
WINNER - FIPRESCI Prize - Berlin Int'l. Film Festival
WINNER - Teddy, Best Feature Film - Berlin Int'l. Film Festival
WINNER - Golden Hitchcock - Dinard British Film Festival
WINNER - Volpi Cup, Best Actress - Venice Film Festival
NOMINATED - Golden Lion - Venice Film Festival
OFFICIAL SELECTION - Sundance Film Festival
OFFICIAL SELECTION - Toronto Int'l. Film Festival
PROGRAM INFORMATION
Type: Blu-ray/DVD
Running Time: 90 minutes
Rating: R
Genre: Drama
Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1 Widescreen
Audio: 5.1 Surround Sound / 2.0 Stereo
About Film Movement
Founded in 2002 as one of the first-ever subscription film services with its DVD-of-the-Month club, Film Movement is now a North American distributor of award-winning independent and foreign films based in New York City. It has released more than 250 feature films and shorts culled from prestigious film festivals worldwide. Film Movement's theatrical releases include American independent films, documentaries, and foreign art house titles. Its catalog includes titles by directors such as Hirokazu Kore-eda, Maren Ade, Jessica Hausner, Andrei Konchalovsky, Andrzej Wajda, Diane Kurys, Ciro Guerra and Melanie Laurent. In 2015, Film Movement launched its reissue label Film Movement Classics, featuring new restorations released theatrically as well as on Blu-ray and DVD, including films by such noted directors as Eric Rohmer, Peter Greenaway, Bille August, Marleen Gorris, Takeshi Kitano, Arturo Ripstein, Sergio Corbucci and Ettore Scola. For more information, please visit www.filmmovement.com.
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