29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

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mistakaninja
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#76 Post by mistakaninja » Mon Mar 31, 2014 6:50 pm

The Second Sight blu does include the scenes excised from the theatrical cut as a deleted scenes feature in the extras.

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Norbie
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#77 Post by Norbie » Wed Apr 02, 2014 1:49 pm

"... essential release ..."

To me an essential release would have to include the Theatrical Cut, and since I have the Australian release there's no need for me to get this BD. Of course, if I didn't have that release than this Criterion release would be a definitive purchase.

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Yaanu
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#78 Post by Yaanu » Tue Apr 15, 2014 6:15 pm

A DVD-only release is now scheduled for July. Supplemental features excluded from this release are the booklet (or a book excerpt; it's not clear) and the reprinted novel.

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FrauBlucher
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#79 Post by FrauBlucher » Mon May 26, 2014 5:48 pm


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FrauBlucher
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#80 Post by FrauBlucher » Wed Jun 04, 2014 12:10 pm


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Feego
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#81 Post by Feego » Wed Jun 04, 2014 2:48 pm

So it appears the extended interview with Weir and new video piece with cast/crew interviews are taken from the old "Dream Within a Dream" doc that has been included on most of the European and Australian releases of the film (at least that's how it appears from the caps on DVD Beaver). These new Criterion features only add up to about 55 minutes, whereas the original doc was about 90 minutes. I wonder what has been left out.

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Kokomo Blues
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#82 Post by Kokomo Blues » Mon Jun 30, 2014 11:05 am

Displacement - This is actually a film about Sara, the girl who did not go to Hanging Rock.

At least it seems so to me.

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What A Disgrace
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#83 Post by What A Disgrace » Sat Aug 16, 2014 11:31 am

I think the Second Sight edition seems like the better purchase. Has anybody here soon both editions, however, to compare the transfer?

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tenia
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#84 Post by tenia » Sat Aug 16, 2014 12:12 pm

It has always seemed to me they have very equivalent transfers.
Then, it's a question of extras, and also the inclusion of the novel. Extras-wise, I'd lean towards the SS though.

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Feego
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#85 Post by Feego » Sat Aug 16, 2014 12:38 pm

The Second Sight DVD edition (not the Blu) is the only edition I'm aware of that includes the longer theatrical version in its entirety. For me, that makes it indispensable. While the scenes that were cut are included on the SS Blu in the deleted scenes section, I think it's very interesting to see them integrated in the film as well. This cut of the film is taken from an old and faded master, but it nonetheless is a fascinating experience. I'm pretty sure all of the other bonus features from the SS Blu are on the DVD. I'll pick up the Criterion Blu eventually and have the best of both worlds.

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movielocke
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#86 Post by movielocke » Wed Oct 01, 2014 1:59 pm

A fine film, moody, ambivalent and a tiny bit haunting. The film explores tensions of class, sexuality and identity making it a surprisingly rich and nuanced exploration of society more than of the maguffinish mystery. I was particularly struck at the parallels between Sara and Michael. Sara is explicitly introduced as being infatuated and obsessed with Miranda, to whom she has written love poems. Given this introduction comes after the sexualized opening montage of girls in their undergarments, we're primed to think of this as a same sex attraction not a friendship. Michael is given a less explicit introduction, but his first action is in seeking out Albert, there's a palpable tension as he and Albert chat, Michael is staring at the boy, and then when Albert deliberately touches his hand in affection (after Michael has been awkwardly avoiding touch), Michael responds by drawing the hand Albert touched up to his lips. When Albert later comments on the girls Michael looks irritated, jealous, and a little bit angry at the girls. He stalks off, if this film were made in the 90s, Michael would be the killer, who killed them in some sort of closeted-gay-rage or some such nonsense. Instead, and far more realistically, Michael, like his foil Sara, becomes obsessed with Miranda-diva. She becomes quite useful as his untouchable ideal, he can seem interested in girls without the awkwardness or unwelcome reciprocation. And his obsession conveniently alienates the girls around him expressing interest and distracts him from Albert.
SpoilerShow
Regarding the disappearance and the omitted final chapter of the book, while watching the film, right after the disappearance, I chuckled to myself, "they're disappeared because they're caught out of time by the rocks, like John Midas." The reference is to a children's book I read long ago, a sequel to the Chocolate Touch (where the young boy John Midas turns everything he touches to Chocolate), the sequel has nothing to do with Chocolate and instead follows the family on vacation to Australia. John Midas wanders and explores the rocks of a famous landmark (like the girls of Picnic at Hanging Rock) and gets sucked out of time. eventually he pops back in time, but a few millenia in the past. In a shocking bit of racism, the white city boy teaches the poor ignorant savages about fire, not eating bugs, making boomerangs, hunting etc Then he gets sucked out of time again and eventually reemerges in his own time. So imagine my surprise when the contents of the omitted final chapter of the book is the reveal that the girls have been caught out of time, just like John Midas.

I do think Weir had read the chapter before they made the film though. The nature shots of flora and fauna and rock after the girls disappear seem to indicate Weir had read the bit about the governess turning into a lizard in the final chapter.
I must confess that the film definitely tricked me as much as reading A Princess Bride did, it wasn't until I got on wikipedia after watching the film that I discovered it is entirely fiction.

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Feego
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#87 Post by Feego » Wed Oct 01, 2014 4:04 pm

movielocke wrote:
SpoilerShow
I do think Weir had read the chapter before they made the film though. The nature shots of flora and fauna and rock after the girls disappear seem to indicate Weir had read the bit about the governess turning into a lizard in the final chapter.
Apparently, nobody read the "lost" chapter before the film was made. It was not published until after Joan Lindsay's death in the 1980s, and until then nobody even knew it existed except for Lindsay and her publisher. In fact, some people question whether or not Lindsay even wrote it, or if it was just a publicity stunt devised by her publisher after her death.

Edit: It's been years since I read the book, but I believe the shots of flora and fauna in the film were directly inspired by Lindsay's own vivid descriptions in the novel. I actually do think both the film and the novel work better without any definitive conclusion. They are both masterpieces of ambiguity.

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bugsy_pal
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#88 Post by bugsy_pal » Fri Oct 03, 2014 10:07 am

Yesterday, I drove with my family from a brief holiday in Melbourne back to Adelaide. We decided to take a longer-then normal route via Bendigo, and on the way to Bendigo, we realised that we were not that far from Hanging Rock. So we took a slight detour and got our first look at it in the 'flesh'. It's an eerie thing, surrounded by a bit of remaining beautiful forest. The bird life around the rock is stunning. It's not a remote location, and unfortunately it of course has all the trappings of tourism in close proximity - toilets, a kiosk, and even a horse racetrack right next to it, which has obviously been there for years. At least they charge a reasonable fee to get in there, which discourages riff-raff from using the place as a drinking and dumping destination.

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Roger Ryan
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#89 Post by Roger Ryan » Fri Oct 03, 2014 12:43 pm

Inspired by your post, I found that Google Maps has a couple of nice 360° views of Hanging Rock...including one where can see visitors actually beginning to vanish! :lol:

AnamorphicWidescreen
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#90 Post by AnamorphicWidescreen » Fri Jan 02, 2015 9:40 pm

Re-watched Picnic at Hanging Rock (for the first time on Blu) recently, and was again truly impressed by the quality of this film. There are so many things going on that it really requires at least 2-3 viewings to fully appreciate. And, despite the fact that this is an early film & he's directed a lot of other great ones since PAHR, this remains my favorite movie by Weir. The dream-like atmosphere, music, & the imagery of these stunning Victorian women (especially the lead) worked really well together...

So, why/how did these women disappear? I guess one of the points of the movie is that we're never meant to know...

That being said, it's interesting to speculate. Did they all fall into a crevice together? That seems to be the only explanation, unless...the film focused on the watches all stopping at the same time when the group was @ Hanging Rock.....
SpoilerShow
Was this supposed to imply that something otherwordly kidnapped these women?! I know I'm probably off-base here since there is nothing to indicate there's anything science-fiction like going in in this film, and none of Weir's other films have any element like this....However, I know that in alleged U.F.O. encounters/abductions?! everyone talks about electricity going out in cars & watches stopping right beforehand...

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movielocke
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#91 Post by movielocke » Sat Jan 03, 2015 4:21 am

Regarding your spoiler I think he's going for a more Gothic aesthetic effect, a Henry james turn of the screw approach.

Robin Davies
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#92 Post by Robin Davies » Sat Jan 03, 2015 10:16 am

My feeling when I first saw it was that it was about the conflict between nature and civilisation. Or, more precisely, between a pagan, sensual identification with the natural world and the repressions of the excessively regimented school system. The sexuality implicit in Valentine's Day is repressed as the girls truss themselves up in corsets and submit to Mrs Appleyard's strict rules on dress and behaviour. As they approach the rock Miss McCraw seems to go into a trance as she recites the geological origins of the rock in rather sexual terms (lava thrusting up from below or something). The rock itself is presented sometimes in rather phallic images (particularly in one of the deleted scenes if I remember right) and the long lizard which brushes against one of the girls as she sleeps seems to echo the same theme of erupting sexuality. This also ties in with the fact that the girls and Miss McCraw had taken off their underwear.

The pan pipe music is very apposite. According to my dictionary Pan was "the spirit of nature, paganism, the pre-Christian or the non-moral world".

It seems to me that the girls are then absorbed or assimilated by the natural world. Miranda is frequently associated with the image of a swan though I don't think she has literally turned into one. The swan represents the beauty of the natural world she has now become a part of. It's also noteworthy that Sara dies in the greenhouse where earlier a gardener had demonstrated plants that moved. Sara herself has now also merged with nature and her beloved Miranda.

I'm not sure how Michael's discovery of Irma fits into all this. His frenzy on the rock also looks a bit sexual to me (though maybe I've just got a one-track mind!) and perhaps it's the release of his male passion that causes Irma to re-emerge in the world of civilisation. The identical mark on their heads suggests they have bonded in some way and it may be a subtle reference to the "mark of Pan" which I think is mentioned in some myths.

The general theme of the film is also expressed in one of my favourite fantasy stories by Algernon Blackwood, appropriately titled The Touch Of Pan.

Well, that's my theory anyway. If you want to be baffled further, check out the "missing" final chapter of the novel which I don't think Weir was aware of, and raises more questions than it answers.

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Feego
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#93 Post by Feego » Sat Jan 03, 2015 1:21 pm

I once read an interesting viewer interpretation that posited that the reason Irma was found was because she was not as in touch with the natural world as the others who disappeared. She is much more worldly and attracted to the material goods and luxuries so valued by upper-class Victorian society. A telling scene is when Mlle. de Poitiers asks Miranda to check her "pretty little diamond watch," to which Miranda replies, "I don't wear it anymore. I can't stand the ticking above my heart." Irma then says that if it were hers, she would wear it always, even in the bath. Miranda has an ethereal, otherworldly quality, almost like a pagan goddess (or a Botticelli angel). Marion and Miss McCraw are both fascinated by science and have a deeper appreciation for nature. It's easy to believe that these three would more readily succumb to whatever transition/transcendence they experience on the rock, whereas Irma and Michael are too intrinsically bound to their Victorian upbringing to fully give themselves over. However, they are permanently changed by their experience (the marks on their heads and Irma's symbolic red cape).

AnamorphicWidescreen
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#94 Post by AnamorphicWidescreen » Sat Jan 03, 2015 7:29 pm

Robin Davies wrote:It seems to me that the girls are then absorbed or assimilated by the natural world. Miranda is frequently associated with the image of a swan though I don't think she has literally turned into one. The swan represents the beauty of the natural world she has now become a part of. It's also noteworthy that Sara dies in the greenhouse where earlier a gardener had demonstrated plants that moved. Sara herself has now also merged with nature and her beloved Miranda.
Feego wrote:Miranda has an ethereal, otherworldly quality, almost like a pagan goddess (or a Botticelli angel). Marion and Miss McCraw are both fascinated by science and have a deeper appreciation for nature. It's easy to believe that these three would more readily succumb to whatever transition/transcendence they experience on the rock
Thanks for the feedback, everyone. This makes a lot more sense than my admittedly off-the-wall interpretation.

I plan on reading the PAHR novel for the first time soon as well, though I have a feeling that will make me even more puzzled (rather than clearing anything up)...

Again, however, I think the point of the film (and presumably the novel as well) is that we're not supposed to know 100% exactly what happened to the women at Hanging Rock...their fates are open to interpretation, which I guess is the whole point...

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hearthesilence
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#95 Post by hearthesilence » Tue Feb 07, 2017 11:11 pm


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captveg
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#96 Post by captveg » Tue Apr 02, 2019 3:48 pm

If anyone comes across the Blu-ray only reissue that is available starting today (at least from some retailers) could they confirm if the book was retained? (When Red River dropped the Dual Format edition the Blu-ray only release retained the book).

Thanks

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swo17
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#97 Post by swo17 » Wed Apr 03, 2019 10:27 pm

captveg wrote:
Tue Apr 02, 2019 3:48 pm
If anyone comes across the Blu-ray only reissue that is available starting today (at least from some retailers) could they confirm if the book was retained? (When Red River dropped the Dual Format edition the Blu-ray only release retained the book).

Thanks
I just checked my local B&N and they didn't have the standalone BD yet but you could probably get it in a Funko Pop version


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Therewolf
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#99 Post by Therewolf » Mon Apr 08, 2019 12:13 am

My local B&N has a copy. Plastic case only.

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captveg
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Re: 29 Picnic at Hanging Rock

#100 Post by captveg » Sat Apr 13, 2019 1:07 pm

Thanks for the feedback.

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