Recently released on Blu-ray and DVD: Princess Mononoke Collector’s Edition, Everyone Stares: The Police Inside Out and The Gospel According to André.
Princess Mononoke Collector’s Edition
The opening frames of Princess Mononoke (1997) suggest the sparseness of traditional Japanese wood-block prints before expanding into a lush green primeval forest world. In those woods dwell gods and demons. Beast-riding humans maintain a fragile bridgehead in an age when they are not the supreme species. Oscar-winning animator Hayao Miyazaki’s film appealed to fans of J.R.R. Tolkien and similar fantasy authors. The Collector’s Edition includes a thoughtful essay in a lavishly illustrated booklet.
Everyone Stares: The Police Inside Out
With much self-deprecation, Police drummer Stewart Copeland narrates this travelogue from the band’s early years. Lacking punk credibility in London, they toured America in 1978, packed into a van, and returned to Europe in ’79 with the wind at their back. The footage, shot by Copeland on Super 8, reveals the goofy hijinks of an unknown band on a long road trip, sleeping in cheap motels, playing small clubs and sitting through record store LP signings.
The Gospel According to André
He is ebulliently regal, given to wearing capes and making sweeping gestures. As a Vogue editor, André Leon Talley influenced the direction of the fashion industry. Talley is a visually (and verbally) ideal subject for a documentary. His story: an African American in the segregated South where excellence was expected; reading Vogue and dreaming of constructing a cosmopolitan persona. The discipline and focus he learned in childhood underlie an exquisitely aesthetic life Oscar Wilde would applaud.
