Happy new year one and all, happy new decade too, and to kick things off well for 2010 there’s news of the latest silent DVD release from the always excellent Edition Filmmuseum, Dziga Vertov’s A Sixth Part of the World (Sestaja cast’ mira) and The Eleventh Year (Odinnadcatyj), with new scores by Michael Nyman.
As your scribe is currently suffering from a sprained wrist (one icy pavement too many), and writing is a bit of a trial, I hope you’ll forgive me if I mostly just give you Edition Filmmuseum’s own words on the release:
Edition Filmmuseum 53
The poetic travelogue A Sixth Part of the World and the “visual symphony” The Eleventh Year mark the beginning of Dziga Vertov’s most creative period, which peaked in the canonical film Man with the Movie Camera. This 2-disc set presents the two rare masterpieces in a new transfer and with new soundtracks by British composer Michael Nyman. The bonus features offer materials on the methods of the filmmaker, as well as an introduction to the Vienna research project on Vertov, “Digital Formalism.”
The Films
Sestaja čast’ mira (A Sixth Part of the World) Soviet Union 1926 Directed by: Dziga Vertov Assistant and editor: Elizaveta Svilova Director of Photography: Michail Kaufman – Produced by: Goskino, Moscow – Premiere: October 19, 1926 (Berlin)
Odinnadcatyj (The Eleventh Year) Soviet Union 1928 Directed by: Dziga Vertov Assistant and editor: Elizaveta Svilova Director of Photography: Michail Kaufman – Produced by: VUFKU, Kiev – Premiere: March 21, 1928 (Kiev)
Im Schatten der Maschine. Ein Montagefilm (In the Shadow of the Machine. A Compilation Film) Germany 1928 Directed by: Albrecht Viktor Blum, Leo Lania – Produced by: Filmkartell “Weltfilm”, Berlin – Premiere: November 9, 1928 (Berlin)
Vertov in Blum. Eine Untersuchung (Vertov in Blum. An Investigation) Austria 2009 Written and directed by: Adelheid Heftberger, Michael Loebenstein, Georg Wasner – Produced by: Österreichisches Filmmuseum, Vienna – First release
DVD features (2-disc DVD)
DVD 1
* Sestaja čast’ mira 1926, 73′
* Music by Michael Nyman
* 32page bilingual booklet with essays by Barbara Wurm, Thomas Tode, Adelheid Heftberger, Aleksandr Derjabin, Michael Loebenstein, Alexander HorwathDVD 2
* Odinnadcatyj 1928, 53′
* Music by Michael Nyman
* Im Schatten der Maschine. Ein Montagefilm 1928, 22′
* Vertov in Blum. Eine Untersuchung 2009, 14′
* ROM section with additional documents and interactive applications about Vertov’s “Phrases” in Odinnadcatyj, the film’s intertitles, the “Blum Affair” and the projekt “Digital Formalism”.Edited by: Österreichisches Filmmuseum, Vienna
DVD authoring: Ralph Schermbach
DVD supervision: Michael Loebenstein, Adelheid Heftberger, Georg WasnerFirst edition: December 2009
Further silents are promised by Edition Filmmuseum soon. Shortly to be released will be Svend Gade’s Hamlet (1920), with Asta Nielsen as the Dane, and Boris ‘Miss Mend’ Barnet’s Devushka s korobkoy & Dom na Trubnoy (1927/28), while these titles are in preparation:
Frankfurt im Film 1900-1945
Karl Valentin und das Kino 1912-1930
Der Hund von Baskerville Rudolf Meinert, 1914
Sein eigner Mörder Max Mack, 1914
Von morgens bis Mitternacht Karl Heinz Martin, 1920
Sappho Dimitri Buchowetzki, 1921
Max Davidson Comedies Leo McCarey, 1927-1928
Abwege Georg Wilhelm Pabst, 1928
Das Mädchen Sumiko Shigeyoshi Suzuki, 1929
Waterloo Karl Grune, 1929
Der lebende Leichnam Fedor Ozep, 1929
The Bioscope 
Happy new year, Luke. I’m surprised no one has jumped on you about calling this the start of a new decade. The “There was no year zero” people have strong opinions on that subject.
I’m sorry to hear about your sprained wrist. I hope you’re following the RICE method (Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevation). Elevation is hard with a wrist. Rest is difficult, too, at least in my experience.
I remember seeing “Man With a Movie Camera” in film class. I’d like to see these movies to compare.
Hi there Joe. I’ve seen all the arguments in the papers aout whether the new decade starts now or a year from now, but clearly there are no pedants in the world of silent cinema (he said, with heavy irony).
I am following the RICE method, or PRICE as it sems to be here (P = Protect). I am slo supposed to avoid HARM = No Heat, Alcohol, Running or Massage. Rather than avoid all those, I should have avoided ice in the first place.
Happy new year, Luke — and to all “Bioscope” watchers. May this blog continue for many a year hence: quite simply the best web site for early/silent cinema.
Re wrist problem: Might I suggest voice recognition software? I use ‘Dragon Naturally Speaking, 9.0’ and it’s pretty good, and gets better as it ‘gets used to’ your voice. When you dictate into it you do get a few errors, but even so it’s a lot quicker than typing — especially if you have a wrist prob, or if, like me, you type with 2 fingers (as I’ve never learned to do it properly).
Hi Stephen,
Normally I’m the fastest two-fingered typist in the West, and the hand is beginning to cure now, if I can just be patient enough to let it rest for another day. But thanks for the tip re NaturallySpeaking, which I’d not come across before. Voice recognition software is going to be huge growth area, as it is a major means to open up online video (and audio) archives. Look at what Google are doing with Gaudi, for instance – http://labs.google.com/gaudi. It’s an area that interests me greatly. Not much to do with silents, though.