Blu-ray, DVD Release: Death in Venice

By
Laurence
– March 3, 2019Find Others: Blu-ray, DVD, Movie, New Release, NewsGet More: , ,

Blu-ray & DVD Release Date: Feb. 19, 2019
Price: DVD $22.97, Blu-ray $27.99
Studio: Criterion

Based on the classic novella by Thomas Mann, Luchino Visconti’s (Senso, Conversation Piece) impassioned late-career drama Death in Venice (1971) is a meditation on the nature of art, the allure of beauty, and the inescapability of death.

A fastidious composer reeling from a disastrous concert, Gustav von Aschenbach (the exquisitely nuanced Dirk Bogarde of Ill Meet by Moonlight fame) travels to Venice to recover. There, he is struck by a vision of pure beauty in the form of a young boy named Tadzio (Björn Andrésen), his infatuation developing into an obsession even as rumors of a plague spread through the city.

Setting Mann’s story of queer desire and bodily decay against the sublime music of Gustav Mahler, Death in Venice is one of the most provocative cinematic literary adaptations of the past half-century, as sensually rich as it is allegorically resonant.

Buy or Rent Death in Venice

Related titles:

  1. Blu-ray, DVD Release: The Night Porter
  2. New Release: The Makioka Sisters Blu-ray and DVD
  3. Blu-ray, DVD Release: Blood Simple
  4. Blu-ray, DVD Release: The Executioner
  5. Blu-ray, DVD Release: Being There

About Laurence

Founder and editor Laurence Lerman saw Alfred Hitchcock’s North by Northwest when he was 13 years old and that’s all it took. He has been writing about film and video for more than a quarter of a century for magazines, anthologies, websites and most recently, Video Business magazine, where he served as the Reviews Editor for 15 years.