Blu-ray Release: Distant Voices, Still Lives

Blu-ray Release Date: Oct. 23, 2018
Price: Blu-ray $25.19
Studio: Arrow/MVD

Winner of the International Critics’ Prize at the 1988 Cannes Film Festival, the wonderful drama Distant Voices, Still Lives marks the debut of England’s Terence Davies (The Deep Blue Sea), one of Britain’s finest filmmaking talents.

Loosely based on the Davies’s own family and upbringing, Distant Voices, Still Lives presents an evocative account of working-class life in Liverpool, England during the 1940s and 50s. Births, marriages and deaths – and an expressive use of music – provide the underpinning for a film that is beautiful, heartbreaking, resonant but never sentimental.

Now regarded as one of the key films in the New British Cinema of the Eighties, the film boasts a marvelous performance from Pete Postlethwaite (Inception) as the head of the family.

Arrow’s new edition of the film is presented in a new 4K restoration (carried out by the British Film Institute) and includes the following features:

• High Definition (1080p) Blu-ray presentation
• Original mono audio (uncompressed LPCM)
• Optional English subtitles for the deaf and hard-of-hearing
• Commentary by writer-director Terence Davies
• Interview with Davies
• Interview with art director Miki van Zwanenberg
• Theatrical trailer
• More to be announced
• Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Jennifer Dionisio
• FIRST PRESSING ONLY: Illustrated collector’s booklet featuring new writing on the film by critic Christina Newland plus archive essays