For Immediate Release
KINO INTERNATIONAL TO RELEASE SAINT CLARA (1996) and KASPAR HAUSER (1993) ON DVD
Kino International is pleased to announce the DVD release of SAINT CLARA (1996), and a new transfer of KASPAR HAUSER (1993), two exciting additions to Kino’s extensive World Cinema series. Available for the first time on DVD, both SAINT CLARA and KASPAR HAUSER will prebook on November 20th, 2007, at the SRP of $24.95, and will officially street on December 18th 2007.
"Surreal ... magical" (Larry Worth, New York Post), and one of the most popular Israeli films in recent years, SAINT CLARA presents a jumpy, highly energetic, and off-kilter Israel where love and the apocalypse seem interconnected.
Beautiful Lucy Dubinchik stars as Clara, a Russian immigrant teenager whose clairvoyant powers create mayhem among the students of Golda Meir Junior High School. When the entire seventh grade class gets perfect scores on a math exam, the faculty is thrown into a crisis. Determined to stamp out this challenge to their authority, the teachers trace the source to Clara. Soon Clara's powers disrupt the whole town as she picks winning lottery numbers and predicts an earthquake. Clara's powers may not last, however – she will lose them the first time she falls in love.
Directed by Ari Folman and Ori Sivan from a novel by Czech dissident Pavel Kohout, SAINT CLARA is hardly your typical teen comedy, and is praised by J. Hoberman (Village Voice) as “"an Israeli film with attitude. Exceptionally fine...Welcome to the Dollhouse crossed with Village of the Damned." It is certainly a rich example of the cinematic talent in Israel today.
SAINT CLARA
1996 Israel 85 min. Color Hebrew w/English subtitles
KASPER HAUSER
Winner of the German "Oscar" for Best Actor, Director, and Picture, KASPAR HAUSER is a powerful mix of social commentary and moody evocative filmmaking. It boasts the visual splendor and sweep of a historical drama while exploring one of the most notorious mysteries of German culture (the subject of more than 2,000 books and a 1974 film by Werner Herzog).
KASPAR HAUSER tells the extraordinary story of an elaborate plot to control the lineage of the throne of the Duchy of Baden. The scheming Countess Hochberg (Katharina Thalbach) conspires to kidnap the rightful heir, Kaspar Hauser, and replace him with a changeling. Kaspar is imprisoned for twelve years until, one day in 1828, he appears on the streets of Nürnberg a crippled, disturbed young man.
André Eisermann delivers a brilliant, moving performance as the child-like Kaspar who, after his discovery on that desolate roadside, is taken under the wings of a succession of benefactors. In a grim, pessimistic reworking of the Pygmalion tale, its wild man is transformed by "civilized" society into a gentleman, even though Kaspar faces the threat of betrayal by the very forces that sought to "rescue" him. With the twists and turns of a complex political thriller, Peter Sehr's (Love The Hard Way) film is a damning portrait of a corrupt, malignant aristocracy that will stop at nothing to conceal the connection between Kaspar Hauser and the throne.
"Amazing! A tour-de-force of wit, originality and poignancy."
– Kevin Thomas, The Los Angeles Times
"A fiendish real-life fairy tale ... a juicy historical drama."
– Stephen Holden, The New York Times
KASPAR HAUSER
1993. Germany 137 min. Color German w/English Subtitles
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