The Sacrifice [Blu-ray]

Director: Andrey Tarkovskiy, Andrei Tarkovsky Andrey Tarkovskiy

Overview

The Sacrifice, director Andrei Tarkovsky's final film, begins in Bergmanesque fashion on a small, remote island, where friends and family gather for drama critic Alexander's (Erland Josephson) birthday celebration. The revelry is interrupted by a radio announcement: World War III has begun, and Mankind is only hours away from utter annihilation. Each of the guests reacts differently to the news: the most dramatic response is Alexander's, who promises God that he'll give up everything he holds dear--including his beloved 6-year-old son -- if war is averted. Allan Edwall, a local mailman with purported mystical powers, offers to intervene with the Creator on Josephson's behalf. The Sacrifice is so dependent upon its visuals and overall mood that any attempt at a detailed synopsis would be woefully inadequate. The willingness of Tarkovsky's protagonist to forego all his possessions may well have sprung from the cancer-ridden director's awareness that he, too, would soon be giving up everything to face his Maker. The Sacrifice won four awards at the Cannes Film Festival, including the Grand Prix.

Product Details

Release Date:	05/15/2018
UPC:	0738329230227
Original Release:	1986
Rating:	NR
Source:	Kino Classics
Region Code:	A
Sound:	[Dolby Digital Stereo]
Language:	English
Time:	2:26:00
Sales rank:	15,568

Special Features

Booklet with excerpts from Andrei Tarkovsky's diaries (courtesy of Seagull Books) and an essay by film scholar Robert Bird; Disc 1 (Blu-ray): Audio Commentary by Layla Alexander-Garrett, Tarkovsky's translator on the set of The Sacrifice; Interview with Michal Leszczylowski, Co-Editor of The Sacrifice and Director of Directed by Andrei Tarkovsky; Disc 2 (DVD): Directed by Andrei Tarkovsky, a documentary on the making of The Sacrifice (102 minutes); Trailers

Cast & Crew

Performance Credits

Erland Josephson	Alexander
Susan Fleetwood	Adelaide
Valérie Mairesse	Julia,Actor
Allan Edwall	Otto
Gudrun Gisladottir	Maria
Sven Wollter	Victor
Filippa Franzen	Marta
Tommy Kjellqvist	Little Man
Watazumido Shuoo	Composer
Watazumido Shuso	Composer

Technical Credits

Andrei Tarkovsky

Lars Hoglund	Special Effects
Lars Palmqvist	Special Effects
Richard Roberts	Special Effects
Svenska Stuntgruppen	Special Effects
Andrey Tarkovskiy	Director
Anna-Lena Wibom	Producer,Executive Producer
Johan Toren	Special Effects
Andrei Tarkovsky	Director,Screenwriter
Katinka Farago	Producer
Rick Roberts	Special Effects
Lisbet Gabrielsson	Producer

Editorial Reviews

Andrei Tarkovsky's final film is an appositely apocalyptic work that serves as a fitting capstone to a brilliant and much too short career. Incorporating many of the thematic and formal concerns of the Soviet master's career, the film has a twilit, haunted quality, no doubt imparted by its ominous nuclear holocaust scenario and Tarkovsky's death from cancer just months after its completion. This parable of belief and redemption seems located on the edge of the world. The children of an esteemed, retired actor gather at the family's far-flung country house to celebrate his birthday. The eerie tranquillity is shattered by the roar of passing jets and news from the continent that a nuclear war has broken out. As always with Tarkovsky, the plot is hardly the point. The eschatological story occasions the kind of grave philosophical and spiritual inquiry that has defined Tarkovsky's movies. Shot by Ingmar Bergman's longtime cinematographer Sven Nykvist, The Sacrifice contains some of the most powerful images in Tarkovsky's monumental oeuvre. Perhaps it's most transcendent moment is the penultimate scene, an epic, six-minute-long take that stands as one of the wonders of cinema. A powerful statement of humility in the face of the unknown, The Sacrifice is an exquisite parting word from one of the great artists of the 20th century.