Classic Bonnie and Clyde and Braveheart to come back to theatre! 4K Restoration throws new trump car

 

The 20th Shanghai International Film Festival announced today the second list of 4K Restoration. On this list are representative works by masters in film industry, such as Eraserhead and Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me by David Lynch, Legend of the Mountain by King Hu and Seven Samurai by Akira Kurosawa. We can also see some great works that would go down in cinematic history, such as Heat, Bonnie and Clyde and Braveheart. After 4K restoration, these classics will generate new power on the big screen and give us great pleasure across time and space. It is definitely worth the expectations! 

 

 

Braveheart, Seven Samurai, Eraserhead, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me, Heat, Bonnie and Clyde, Legend of the Mountain 

 

Introduction of the movies 

 

Braveheart

 

Director: Mel Gibson

Stars: Mel Gibson/Sophie Marceau/ Brian Cox/ James Cosmo 

 

 

The movie is about William Wallace who is a Scottish rebel and hero. Wallace’ father died fighting against the English army when Wallace was just a little boy. After his father’s death, he was taken abroad to learn Scottish culture and martial arts from his father’s friend. When Wallace comes back home as a grown man, he falls in love with Murron and asks her to marry him. But Murron is executed by English soldiers. Wallace leads his clan to rebel against the English army. In order to mitigate the tension, King Edward sent Isabella to negotiate with Wallace. Since the King wants nothing but buying Wallace out and doesn\'t care about freedom and justice in Scotland at all, the negotiation fails. But Isabella knows nothing about it. When she returns home and finds out the truth that King Edward is planning some schemes, she immediately sends the message to Wallace. There is love between them, accompanied by the wars and schemes…

 

Highly recommended: Braveheart would definitely be ranked as the No.1 movie that has the most influence on movie fans who were born in the 1980s. This movie about the Scottish hero, directed and acted by Mel Gibson, is a magnificent epic. The movie ends with a heartfelt resounding outcry for “Freedom” to express the true meaning of the word “hero”. Mel Gibson showed his extraordinary versatility in this movie and made a patriotic movie with profound meanings and touching humanity. 

 

Seven Samurai

 

Director: Akira Kurosawa

Stars: Toshiro Mifune, Takashi Shimura, Yoshio Inaba, Seiji Miyaguchi, Minoru Chiaki

 

During the Sengoku Period of Japanese history, bandits plan to raid a mountain village. To protect their harvest, the village elder decides to hire samurai to protect the village. They could only pay them with three rice meals a day. But they are refused by most samurai in the city while searching for someone to hire until they found Kambei who is now a ronin. After initial reluctance, Kambei agrees. Then he recruits another six samurai: Shichirōj, Katsushirō, Gorobei, Heihachi, Kyūzō and Kikuchiyo. The seven samurai are now the protectors of the village. While preparing for defense, the samurai have some conflicts with the villagers, some of which are quite amusing. But in one attack, one samurai is shot and dies while rescuing a villager. Bandits come back soon and a fierce battle is about to begin.

 

Highly recommended: On different ranking lists of Japanese movies, Seven Samurai ranks the first on the top. Akira Kurosawa might want to make it an action/entertainment film, but the whole work is full of the humanity with Akira Kurosawa’s signature. It not only changed the format of traditional Japanese swordsmen movies but also has great impact on many other swordsmen and action movies after it. The seven samurai in the movie have different characters, representing seven aspects of the Bushido. They are Bushido altogether. In their minds, samurai should be proud and higher in social rank, but despite their conflicts with the villagers, they would still sacrifice their lives for the village. In the end of the movie, Akira Kurosawa turned the whole belief that samurai have built their lives on upside down, so that people could see human nature as it is and the cruelty of a turbulent society. For the battle scenes, Akira Kurosawa uses multiple continuous shots, coupled with quick editing, long-focus filming and slow-motion to integrate the images, resulting in a movie that would go down in the world’s cinema history. 

 

Eraserhead

 

Director: David Lynch

Stars: Jack Nance, Charlotte Stewart, Allen Joseph, Jeanne Bates, Hal Landon Jr. 

 

The story takes place in a dark and depressing industrial town. When Henry first visits his girlfriend’s family, he finds it a weird and twisted one. He is forced to marry his girlfriend, and becomes a father to a deformed baby overnight. Everything frightens and frustrates him. When his wife runs away in the middle of the night because of the baby’s crying, Henry couldn\'t take it anymore…

 

Highly recommended: Eraserhead is the first feature film by David Lynch, an iconic figure in American New Wave movement. It took him 5 years to finish the movie. In the relatively traditional and conservative 1970s for film industry, the movie was in the spotlight of critics once in theatre. With this strange and experimental work, David Lynch made his name as a director. 

 

Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me

 

Director: David Lynch

Stars: Sheryl Lee, Ray Wise, Mädchen Amick/Dana Ashbrook/David Bowie 

 

A 16-year-old girl, Laura, is killed in Twin Peaks. The movie is about the girl’s inner world before she dies. She has been living in the shadow of her evil father since a childhood tragedy. 

 

Highly recommended: The TV series Twin Peaks was a hit on television in the late 1980s. David Lynch was the producer of the show. After the show finished airing, he filmed the movie Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me. He was obsessed with the inner world of Laura where contradictions devoured her heart. He wanted to see what she saw before she died, so he made the black and gloomy world of hers. 

 

Heat

 

 

Director: Michael Mann

Stars: Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, Val Kilmer 

 

Neil is a career criminal, but he falls in love with a designer, Eady, and he starts thinking about quitting and having an ordinary life. In the last bank robbery, his crew suffers one death and one injury because of treachery, so he decides to seek revenge for his crew. He also wants to have one last round of battle with his old rival—Vincent, a LAPD lieutenant.

 

Highly recommended: Al Pacino and Robert De Niro gave the most brilliant and classic performance in this movie. 

 

Bonnie and Clyde

 

Director: Arthur Penn

Stars: Warren Beatty, Faye Dunaway, Michael Pollard, Gene Hackman, Estelle Parsons 

 

This movie is based on a true story about the famous Bonnie and Clyde. In 1930 during the Great Depression, Bonnie sees Clyde stealing her mother’s car. Clyde falls in love with Bonnie at first sight and brags about his prison life. He even robs a grocery store in front of Bonnie. The two then become partners in crime across the country. They even form their own gang, the Barrow Gang. 

 

Highly recommended: Bonnie and Clyde won 2 Oscars of its 10 nominations in the 1968 Academy Awards (Best Supporting Actress and Best Cinematography). In the late 1960s when anti-war and free speech movements were on the rise, the couple’s rebellious and freedom-pursuing spirit rang resonance among many young Americans. In this year’s Oscar award ceremony, the two leads, Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway, announced the wrong best picture winner on the stage. 

 

Legend of the Mountain

 

Director: King Hu

Stars:Shih Chun, Hsu Feng, Sylvia Chang, Tien Feng, Mingcai Wu 

 

 

Ho, a young scholar who has failed the imperial examination, copies Buddhist sutras called Da Shou Yin (Book of Big Hand) which is said to have power over this life and afterlife. He meets a mysterious flute-playing girl for three times. Then he comes to a general’s home where he is warmly welcomed by General Cui Hongzhi and an old lady Wang Po. He also meets a beautiful girl Yue Niang. When they are having dinner, Yue Niang plays the drum, and Ho starts drifting off in the drum sounds. On the next morning, Ho wakes up to find that he is in the same room with Yue Niang. Wang Po suggests that they should get married. But there is a scheme behind all of this…

 

Highly recommended: As a world-renowned Chinese movie director, King Hu blends in the film the complicated Chinese traditional culture: Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, ghosts and swordsmen…all of which are conveyed in beautiful and meaningful scenes to make a classic mysterious work.