Blow-Up (Michelangelo Antonioni, 1966)

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[Paul]

Bet you never thought, Michael Winner, Arthur Penn and Michael-Angelo Antonioni’s names could ever be used in the same sentence? In the late 1960s, all three filmmakers pushed the boundaries of what was possible with English language cinema – Winner was the first to use the ‘F’ word in his seminal I’LL NEVER FORGET WHAT’S ‘IS NAME (the expletive uttered by the late Oliver Reed). Penn waged war on the censors with his ultra violent BONNIE AND CLYDE and Antonioni’ BLOW-UP was one of the first films to feature full-frontal nudity.

Blow-Up however, is far more influential in terms of its narrative structure, than its display of flesh and infamous orgy scene. David Hemmings plays Thomas – a Baileyesque fashion photographer, making the most of free-love in Swinging Sixties’ London. A bit of a voyeur, Thomas likes nothing more than to take pictures of subjects that are unaware of his presence. Whilst out one morning, Thomas snaps a couple in a park, attracting the attention of the woman, who becomes desperate to retrieve the film. Later, Thomas lures the woman, Jane (Vanessa Redgrave) back to his flat, promising her the film but hoping to get her into bed. After some heavy flirtation, Jane leaves with the film but Thomas has already made a copy. Thomas develops the film and soon discovers that all is not what it first seemed. Convinced that there’s a third person, hidden in some nearby bushes, Thomas enlarges the picture and so the mystery begins…

Over the years, Antonioni’s film has been responsible for a raft of homages/rip-offs, including Francis Ford Coppola’s THE CONVERSATION, Richard Donner’s THE OMEN, Brian De Palma’s BLOW OUT and Dario Argento’s PROFONDO ROSSO (which also starred Hemmings). Although definitely a product of its time (it was made in 1966), the film has aged considerably well and stands as landmark achievement in filmmaking technique and narrative structure.

[Amy]

Bet you never thought, Michael Winner, Arthur Penn and Michael-Angelo Antonioni’s names could ever be used in the same sentence? In the late 1960s, all three filmmakers pushed the boundaries of what was possible with English language cinema – Winner was the first to use the ‘F’ word in his seminal I’LL NEVER FORGET WHAT’S ‘IS NAME (the expletive uttered by the late Oliver Reed).

it was marianne faithfull who said it, not oliver..it was towards the end and the bit with the ad and all his girlfriends and josie(miss faithfull) says fuck off you bastard or fuck you, you bastard..it was the f word with bastard.
altho they seemed to cut her part down, i've seen a few photos from the film of her that don't turn up in it.

great film tho. really deserves a dvd release.

[Michael Blanton]

great film tho. really deserves a dvd release.

Yes, great film!

On February 22, 2000, Anchor Bay released a R1 NTSC DVD, but it's now OOP.

Blow Up (Amazon)

[ecc]

Anchor Bay's OOP discs of I'LL NEVER FORGET WHAT'S HIS NAME and Jack Cardiff's GIRL ON A MOTORCYCLE are both pretty pricey as used discs. 

great film tho. really deserves a dvd release.

Yes, great film!

On February 22, 2000, Anchor Bay released a R1 NTSC DVD, but it's now OOP.


 http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/6305768374/imdb-adbox/

[eurocultfan1964]

Hi All,
I recently bought the current Warner UK release of BlowUp,and found the soundtrack to have been mastered at a very low level, necessitating a major increase in the volume level on my amp.It still didn't sound quite right however.

Searching for further possible Antonioni purchases I came across a user review on Amazon US that mentioned a fault with the soundtrack master. It seems a stereo master was used but only one channel made it to the DVD master resulting in final DVDs with half the soundtrack missing !

Sorry if this is old news,but does anyone know whether this release is definitely flawed ?   Has this fault ever been corrected? Is there a correct DVD available anywhere?

To add insult to injury BlowUp was shown on BBC4 just after I watched the DVD, but before I read about this problem so unfortunately I did not record it for comparison sake.

[Paul]

I'm pretty sure this was a one channel affair on the DVD, with all the audio coming through the centre speaker - it's been a while since I watched my DVD, in all honesty. If Warner had mistakenly released the DVD with one channel of audio instead of two, I'm quite sure it was have been pulled and reissued correctly. Both the R1 and R2 discs were released in early 2004, so they've been out five years. I'm sure something would have been done by now. this is the first I've heard of the problem you mention, but it doesn't mean it's untrue.

A lot of similar films have soundtracks that border on the inaudible. All versions of DON'T LOOK NOW (I've had the French release, the Warner UK and the most recent one from Optimum), for example, but it always plays out very quietly.

[eurocultfan1964]

I'd not seen BlowUp for many years and thought I'd re-aquaint myself,and as you say surely Warners would have corrected any problem if there was one.However over at the DVD Times review site a  number of people have commented on this at the bottom of their 2004 DVD review

http://www.dvdtimes.co.uk/content/id/11058/blow-up.html

[Paul]

Thanks for the link to that - you would have thought they'd have done something aobut this by now, wouldn't you?