Tod Browning's Sideshow Shockers - Freaks / The Unknown / The Mystic (Criterion)

[whiteberry]

The world is a carnival of criminality, corruption, and psychosexual strangeness in the twisted pre-Code shockers of Tod Browning. Early Hollywood’s edgiest auteur, Browning drew on his experiences as a circus performer to create subversive pulp entertainments set amid the world of traveling sideshows, which, with their air of the exotic and the disreputable, provided a pungent backdrop for his sordid tales of outcasts, cons, villains, and vagabonds. Bringing together two of his defining works (The Unknown and Freaks) and a long-unavailable rarity (The Mystic), this cabinet of pre-Code curiosities reveals a master of the morbid whose ability to unsettle is matched only by his daring compassion for society’s most downtrodden.

Freaks 1932
The most transgressive film produced by a major American studio in the 1930s, Tod Browning’s crowning achievement has haunted the margins of cinema for nearly one hundred years. An unforgettable cast of real-life sideshow performers portray the entertainers in a traveling circus who, shunned by mainstream society, live according to their own code—one of radical acceptance for the fellow oppressed and, as the show’s beautiful but cruel trapeze artist learns, of terrifying retribution for those who cross them. Received with revulsion by viewers upon its initial release, Freaks effectively ended Browning’s career but can now be seen for what it is: an audacious cry for understanding and a singular experience of nightmarish, almost avant-garde power.

The Unknown 1927
The most celebrated and exquisitely perverse of the many collaborations between Tod Browning and his legendary leading man Lon Chaney, The Unknown features a wrenchingly physical performance from “the Man of a Thousand Faces” as the armless Spanish knife thrower Alonzo (he flings daggers with his feet) whose dastardly infatuation with his beautiful assistant (Joan Crawford)—a woman, it just so happens, who cannot bear to be touched by the hands of any man—drives him to unspeakable extremes. Sadomasochistic obsession, deception, murder, disfigurement, and a spectacular Grand Guignol climax—Browning wrings every last frisson from the lurid premise.

The Mystic 1925
A fantastically atmospheric but rarely seen missing link in the development of Tod Browning’s artistry, set amid his favored milieu of shadowy sideshows and clever criminals, The Mystic provides a striking showcase for silent-era diva Aileen Pringle, who sports a series of memorably outré looks (courtesy of art-deco designer Erté) as Zara, a phony psychic in a Hungarian carnival who, under the guidance of a Svengali-like con man (Conway Tearle), crashes—and proceeds to swindle—American high society. Browning’s fascination with the weird is on full display in the eerie séance sequences, while his subversive moral ambiguity extends surprising sympathy to even the most seemingly irredeemable of antiheroes.

SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES

• New 2K digital restoration of Freaks, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack on the Blu-ray
• New 2K digital restoration of The Mystic, with a new score by composer Dean Hurley
• New 2K digital reconstruction and restoration of The Unknown by the George Eastman Museum, with a new score by composer Philip Carli
• Audio commentaries on Freaks and The Unknown and an introduction to The Mystic by film scholar David J. Skal
• New interview with author Megan Abbott about director Tod Browning and pre-Code horror
• Archival documentary on Freaks
• Reading of “Spurs,” the short story by Tod Robbins on which Freaks is based
• Prologue to Freaks, which was added to the film in 1947
• Program on the alternate endings to Freaks
• Video gallery of portraits from Freaks
• English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
• PLUS: An essay by film critic Farran Smith Nehme

Coming soon, available Oct 17, 2023

https://www.criterion.com/boxsets/69...eshow-shockers

[Akijama]

https://www.criterion.com/boxsets/69...eshow-shockers

Coming in October

[Batgirl911]

This really tips my table.

[Ruemorgue10]

Freaks, at long last!!!

[Gacivory]

Pretty excited for this!

[Tylerfan]

Aw yeah

[Röckzilla]

Freaks (1932) FINALLY on Blu-ray?!

And just in time for Halloween too...

Gabba Gabba Hey!

[dig311dug]

I think this announcement broke criterion.com

[Brad1963]

The Tod Browning set is definitely the highlight for October.

[deltatauhobbit]

Calling it, best announcement for October.

[ponderingtheuniverse]

This is one of the coolest blu-ray covers I've ever seen! Like Haxan, I'd want to own it as a poster.

[heebiejeebie]

Awesome announcement! I've been waiting for Freaks.

[Rayjg]

Criterion releasing silent films What a bunch of freaks.

[dylrichard02]

Hell yes! This is awesome!

[nothingtogein]

At long last!

[dig311dug]

Is it $69.95 MSRP because they know people will spend that amount?
Combined runtime of all movies is about as long as an actual long movie.

[starsteam]

Originally Posted by dig311dug

Is it $69.95 MSRP because they know people will spend that amount?
Combined runtime of all movies is about as long as an actual long movie.

It's $69.95 because it goes on sale half-off two weeks after release.

[GeoffOliver]

Hell yeah! Been waiting a long time for both Freaks and The Unknown. I saw Freaks theatrically as the second half of a late night double feature with King Kong a few years ago, at an old cinema from the 1920s. Was definitely a trip. The audience that stayed for the film seemed to get into it. It was an officially licensed DCP from Warner Bros, but still looked pretty rough. Too bad it looks like this isn’t the long fabled original cut, but I’m not surprised since it’s almost certainly lost (and was never even screened outside previews).

[dig311dug]

Originally Posted by starsteam

It's $69.95 because it goes on sale half-off two weeks after release.

Other releases around the same time are not inflated for potential half-off sales.

[IPreferPi]

Pretty stoked Freaks is finally getting a Blu-ray release, by Criterion no less.