The Films of Alejandro Jodorowsky (Fando y Lis / El Topo / The Holy Mountain)
by Alejandro Jodorowsky
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Alejandro JodorowskyDirector: Alejandro Jodorowsky
Brand: JODORWSKY,ALEJANDRO
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); Portuguese (Subtitled); Spanish (Published)
Format: Box set, Color, DVD-Video, NTSC
Picture Format: 2.35:1
Running Time: 333 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2007-05-01
Audience Rating: R (Restricted)
Studio: Starz / Anchor Bay
Movie Reviews of The Films of Alejandro Jodorowsky (Fando y Lis / El Topo / The Holy Mountain)
Movie Review: Without peer, without equal
Summary: 5 Stars
Having seen numerous art-house and cult flicks in my day, I thought I was prepared for the madness of Alejandro Jodorowsky. A forum about "The Weirdest Films Ever" tipped me off to his existence. That forum made plenty of reference to some of my favorite directors, including Lynch, Cronenberg, and Bunuel. But Jodorowsky was regarded as the "weirdest" of them all. I felt I had enough weird-film experience to handle his oevre. I was quite wrong.
I'd venture to say nothing in film history is quite like these movies. The first time I watched them, I was absolutely blown away. Jodorowsky's psychedelic surreality is simply without equal, it is profoundly bizarre and effective. His visuals can appeal to fans of the avant-garde as much as they appeal to the gorehound. But there is more to these films than simple freak-out shock tactics. A lifetime of study concerning mysticism, both Eastern and Western, informs the plot and set of "El Topo" and "The Holy Mountain," but Jodorowsky creates a singular vision. There is a definite sense of humanity in all of his films, strange as they are. He is to gnostic Westerns as Lynch is to small-town nightmares.
To describe these films in anything but nebulous terms is an exercise in futility. One simply has to experience Jodorowsky to even begin understanding the worldview he espouses through his art. If you enjoy the farthest reaches of film making, you owe it to yourself to buy this box set.
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Summary of The Films of Alejandro Jodorowsky (Fando y Lis / El Topo / The Holy Mountain)
Among the extras included in this collector's box is previously unseen footage, a feature on the restoration process, an exclusive interview with Jodorowsky, optional director commentary tracks, subtitles, two special CDs of the films' soundtracks and a separate DVD of the first film ever made by Jodorowsky, La Cravate.
EL TOPO:
-Original theatrical trailer- English V.O.
-2006 on camera interview with Jodorowsky (Language English/English subtitles)
-Photo Gallery/Original script excerpts
-Exclusive interview with Alejandro Jodorowsky
THE HOLY MOUNTAIN
- Deleted scenes with director commentary (Language: Spanish with optional EN, SP, FR & BR PORT subtitles)
- Original theatrical trailer -English V.O
- The Tarot short with director commentary (Language: Spanish with optional EN, SP, FR & BR PORT subtitles)
- Restoration process short (Original Language English)
- Photo Gallery / Original Script excerpts
- Restoration Credits
FANDO Y LIS
-La Constellation Jodorowsky documentary
-Original language French and English Stereo
TWO AUDIO CDS
- El Topo soundtrack
- The Holy Mountain soundtrack
How can so much mysticism be contained in a simple DVD box set? The Films of Alejandro Jodorowsky is a divine collection of the director's early films, restored and ready for repeated viewings. For it does take several viewings to imbue Jodorowky's invented archetypes with personal meaning and to familiarize oneself with his avant-garde approach to communicating artistic concepts. In this box, El Topo and Holy Mountain, Jodorowsky's stories of spiritual journeys through barren deserts, are paired with Fando Y Lis and La Cravate, a never before seen gem from the 1950s. This alone justifies the box set. La Cravate is a Technicolor tale of a man whose sadistic girfriend urges him to visit the head shop to shop for a new head. Miming his way through rows of living human heads, and trying several on with the help of a shop manager skilled in stitching skin, this Frankensteinian story establishes Jodorowsky's affinity for pitting effusive love against cruelty for maximum tension between involved characters. Fando Y Lis, on the other hand, is an early version of the later two masterpieces, about a couple whose quest for an imaginary land in the future, called Tar, introduces them to wizened forest masters, wild packs of women bowling, and enlightened drag queens. Filmed in black and white, Fando Y Lis proves that Jodorowsky's radical use of color in El Topo and Holy Mountain is no simple trope. Here, he relies more heavily on dramatic physical action, including miming and a paraplegic protagonist who is wheeled around in a wagon by her lover.
The box set contains the film soundtracks, director commentaries, and several interviews with Jodorowsky, including the documentary, La Constellation, in which he discusses his reliance on intuition, the notion of absurdism versus mystery, and his infamous usage of violence, which he eloquently explains as creative violence versus the destructive. Though this talented director refuses the claim that he is a mystic, it becomes clear in watching this body of work that he is achieving the sublime in a visually transcendental fashion. --Trinie Dalton
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