Danish Directors - Carl Dreyer

  Note: All payments on movie orders will be processed at the time of shipment. Most films are special orders, so they will take longer to ship than other products.

Welcome to our foreign films page, featuring foreign movies in video and DVD format in languages from a host of countries. Note: unless stated otherwise, all videocassettes are in VHS and NTSC format, and all DVDs are for players that support Region 1 encoding (United States and Canada) and are in NTSC format. Check our DVD Compatibility FAQ for more information about region encoding, television formats, and other specifications. If you can't find what you need, please email us.

Special offer: every time you buy three videos, get one free! Just include the promo code MBVideo3plus1 while ordering four videos, and we'll give you the lowest-priced video free.

Danish Directors - Carl Dreyer

Carl Theodor Dreyer: Criterion Collection Special Edition Box Set Carl Theodor Dreyer/Torben Skodt Jensen This set includes three of Dreyer's greatest films, plus a fine documentary on the perfectionist filmmaker. Day of Wrath (1943, 97 mins.) premiered during the blackest period of Nazi occupation of Denmark and tells a story of witchcraft in 1623 with great atmospheric intensity. Ordet (1955, 125 mins.) is Dreyer's brilliant portrayal of the conflict between organized religion and personal belief. Gertrud (1964, 116 mins.), Dreyer's last film, is a rigorous, poignant and profound tale of a woman's life crippled by an inability to compromise. Finally, Carl Th. Dreyer: My Metier (1995, 94 mins.) is Torben Skodt Jensen's thorough survey of the director's brilliant career as well as an intimate glimpse into his personality. Each disc also comes with supplemental features: interviews with some of the films' stars, photo still galleries, and archival footage of Dreyer himself. All films are in Danish (My Metier also in French) with optional English subtitles, and presented in their original aspect ratios. Denmark, 1943-1995, 432 mins. DVD $99

Leaves from Satan's Book Carl Theodor Dreyer Dreyer sketches Satan's path through four historical periods, in each as a disrupter of the social forces through already powerful male leaders. Dreyer associates the figure of Christ with female figures, and the photography and composition anticipate his later Passion of Joan of Arc. Greatly inspired by D.W. Griffiths' Intolerance. Silent with English title cards, music score, and color tinting. Denmark, 1920, 121 mins. DVD $44.95

The Passion of Joan of Arc Carl Theodor Dreyer The restored version of one of the truly great works in motion picture history. Lost for nearly fifty years, Dreyer's original cut of the film (which had previously circulated only in heavily altered versions) was found in a janitor's closet before it was reintroduced to the world. The film is accompanied by Richard Einhorn's Voices of Light an oratorio inspired by the film that is performed by Anonymous 4, the Nederlands Radio Choir and the Nederlands Radio Philharmonic. "You cannot know the history of silent film unless you know the face of Renee Maria Falconetti. In a medium without words, where the filmmakers believed that the camera captured the essence of characters through their faces, to see Falconetti in Dreyer's The Passion of Joan of Arc is to look into eyes that will never leave you" (Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times). DVD has optional stereo music track. Silent with French intertitles and English Subtitles. France, 1928, 82 mins. DVD $59.95

Vampyr Carl Theodor Dreyer Vampyr tells with extraordinary images the nightmarish story of a young man who unwittingly becomes involved with two sisters and their father, all victims of a vampire. Dreyer has transformed LeFanu's horror tale Camilla into an abstract meditation on the theme of death, and his brilliant use of shadow, light, camera movement and settings are as unnerving today as they were upon this sinister film's release over 75 years ago. "A great vampire film. Dreyer preys upon our subconscious fears...its mood is evocative, dreamy, spectral" (Pauline Kael). Criterion Collection Edition. Newly restored hi-def digital transfer of the 1998 film restoration by Martin Koerber and the Cineteca di Bologna. Includes optional all-new English-text version of the film, audio commentary featuring film scholar Tony Rayns, Carl Th. Dreyer (1966), a documentary by Jorgen Roos chronicling Dreyer's career, visual essay by scholar Casper Tybjerg on Dreyer's influences, a radio broadcast of Dreyer reading an essay about filmmaking, improved English subtitles, and a booklet featuring new essays by Mark Le Fanu and Kim Newman, Martin Koerber on the restoration, and an archival interview with star Nicolas de Gunzburg, as well as a book featuring Dreyer and Christen Jul's original screenplay and Sheridan Le Fanu's 1871 story Carmilla. In German with optional English subtitles. Denmark, 1932, 75 mins. DVD $59.95