One of the occupational hazards of studying central and eastern European cinema is actually getting to see many of the films in the first place – especially when moving off the beaten track and exploring short and animated films. Things have significantly improved thanks to the DVD revolution, but rights and materials availability and distributors’ prejudices mean that while certain major figures (Jan Švankmajer, Yuri Norstein) have been very well catered for, others remain almost invisible.
Walerian Borowczyk doesn’t exactly fall into this category, as most of his features are now available on DVD (though not yet Blanche or Docteur Jekyll et les femmes, two of my favourites) – but these almost entirely represent the second half of his career, when he turned his wayward talent to a number of films running the gamut from stylish erotica to outright porn. Not that there’s anything wrong with that (I defended the later films in my Sight & Sound obituary in the April 2006 issue), but Borowczyk’s reputation as a major artist almost entirely comes from the pre-1973 films. And aside from his first live-action feature Goto, Isle of Love (Goto, l’île d’amour), these still remain frustratingly inaccessible – especially the animated work, which is the primary reason why filmmakers like the Quay Brothers revere him to this day.
That said, a handful of the animated shorts have popped up on assorted French and Italian DVDs – I’ve now amassed eight in all, though it meant buying two additional copies of The Beast (La Bête) to go alongside my UK edition, creating the impression that I’m some kind of depraved bestialist to anyone misguided enough to have a rummage through my shelves without an advance warning. These are the various supporting shorts on the French and Italian editions:
- La Bête (Arte, France) has Les Astronautes (1960), Renaissance (1963), Les Jeux des anges (1964), Rosalie (1966), Une Collection particulière (1973, shorter version) and Scherzo infernal (1984) – there are no subtitles on any of these, but only the last three need them.
- Cofanetto Walerian Borowczyk (Columbia TriStar, Italy) has, in addition to the features Goto, Immoral Tales (Contes immoraux) and The Beast (all in French with Italian subtitles, or dubbed Italian), Les Astronautes, Une Collection particulière (1973, shorter version), Escargot de Venus (1975), L’Amour monstre de tous les temps (1977) and Scherzo Infernal (1984), all in French with Italian subtitles.
But those who don’t want to go to such lengths and who have a fast enough broadband connection can sample five shorts here and now, courtesy of UbuWeb, which has uploaded complete videos of Dom (1958), Les Astronautes, Une Collection particulière, Escargot de Venus and L’Amour monstre de tous les temps. The last three are in unsubtitled French, the first two have no spoken content. The quality is, as you’d expect, somewhat ropey (and clearly copyright-infringing, for all the site’s elaborate disclaimers), but better copies of all but Dom are available on the DVDs mentioned above.
Here’s an introduction to Walerian Borowczyk: The Orchestrating Angel, an exhibition of his work at Annecy, and a piece on Culture.pl by Jan Strekowski (April 2004, updated February 2006), which has the most comprehensive annotated filmography that I’ve come across to date.