Pink Floyd - The Wall 25th Anniversary (Deluxe Edition)

Amazon.com

By any rational measure, Alan Parker's cinematic interpretation of Pink Floyd: The Wall is a glorious failure. Glorious because its imagery is hypnotically striking, frequently resonant, and superbly photographed by the gifted cinematographer Peter Biziou. And a failure because the entire exercise is hopelessly dour, loyal to the bleak themes and psychological torment of Roger Waters's great musical opus, and yet utterly devoid of the humor that Waters certainly found in his own material. Any attempt to visualize The Wall would be fraught with artistic danger, and Parker succumbs to his own self-importance, creating a film that's as fascinating as it is flawed.

The film is, for better and worse, the fruit of three artists in conflict--Parker indulging himself, and Waters in league with designer Gerald Scarfe, whose brilliant animated sequences suggest that he should have directed and animated this film in its entirety. Fortunately, this clash of talent and ego does not prevent The Wall from being a mesmerizing film. Boomtown Rats frontman Bob Geldof (in his screen debut) is a fine choice to play Waters's alter ego--an alienated, "comfortably numb" rock star whose psychosis manifests itself as an emotional (and symbolically physical) wall between himself and the cold, cruel world. Weaving Waters's autobiographical details into his own jumbled vision, Parker ultimately fails to combine a narrative thread with experimental structure. It's a rich, bizarre, and often astonishing film that will continue to draw a following, but the real source of genius remains the music of Roger Waters. --Jeff Shannon

Description

Track List:
1.Original film presented in high-definition widescreen and mixed in 5.1 surround sound
2."The Other Side Of The Wall" - a 25 minute documentary about the making of the film
3."Retrospective" - an exclusive 45 minute retrospective documentary of interviews with Roger Waters, Alan Parker, Gerald Scarfe, Peter Biziou, Alan Marshall and James Guthrie 4.Original film trailer and production stills

In celebration of the quarter-century anniversary, Columbia Records is releasing a special limited edition DVD of this landmark film. Packaged in a deluxe DVD digi-pak designed to look like The Wall with debossed brick work and a clear O-card, this stunning release features a photo montage of film shots and a fold-out reproduction of the original film promotional poster. All the artwork and design for this lavish packaging has been coordinated by original Pink Floyd designers Peter Curzon and Storm Thorgerson.

Customer Reviews:

Cult Classic but would've been better with a different director.......2007-09-09

Looking back at Alan Parker's work, he was great for capturing the dark side of postwar England. You watch "Angelas Ashes" and "The Committments" and you can see the thread that leads back to "The Wall".

Supposedly there's a screentest that had Roger Waters audition for the role of Pink, but Boomtown Rat and Live Aid/Live 8 mastermind Sir Bob Geldof got the part. And he wasn't a Pink Floyd fan until years later.

But I think Parker made it a little too downbeat. There are things on the album that I think Roger comes across a little more over the top through it, and hopeful towards the end.

There is a story, but it's very nonlinear. You see the rock star's spiral into his own madness (similar to Syd Barrett) and what drove him there, but the theme of "The Wall" is a breakdown in communication and the walls we build around us, or built by others. You assume there's redemption at the end but it's really hard to tell.

Does the wife take up with the lover because Pink was sleeping with groupies to begin with? "Young Lust" should've captured Pink putting the band together a little more, out on the hunt for nubile maidens as the song suggests, instead of turning it into being about the groupies. By the time the groupie gets to Pink, his wall is already in place...bored and uninterested. The mother in the movie isn't all that menacing, neither is the wife until "The Trial". I thought this should've been ratcheted up a lot. The teacher however, is dead on. "Another Brick in the Wall" is definitely one of the best parts.

The highlight of the film is "Comfortably Numb"... it's wonderfully filmed and is as creepy as anything Cronenberg's done.

Scarfe's animation had been used for the band's live shows and is used here, also a great highlight of the movie.

Big reason to have this is because it's in surround. The documentary's ok, and seeing the original "Another Brick in the Wall II" promo's cool.

Birth of a fan.......2007-07-09

Back in the day, when I was in high school, I absolutely could not stand Pink Floyd with the exception of one song (Wish You Were Here). When tracks came across the radio I just tried not to listen and couldn't understand they hype.
Then for reasons I can't recall, my girlfriend (later my wife) and I went to see The Wall when it released at the theater. I sat, mesmerized and staring at the screen. To see the movie is to hear the entire album set from start to finish and the movie put it all in context. The thing I was missing before, I understood now. The music of Pink Floyd is put together in albums and if you don't listen to them that way they are disconnected and just don't make sense.
Now I was hooked and started to listen to PF albums instead of individual cuts. I bought the cassette tape (hi-tech back then), wore it out, wore out a backup copy, wore out another tape and years later bought the CD set. Today I'm buying the DVD and can't wait to experience it all again.
Bottom line, the movie is dark, it is disturbing, and it is terribly awesome. Pink Floyd played the music of the insane. Maybe it is the insane who still play the music of Pink Floyd. In any case, I can't wait to introduce my 15 year-old son to it. Wonder if his jaw will drop like mine did?

Awesome! This movie rock!.......2007-05-16

Awesome! This movie rock!

Audio is much better than the original version. It's really worth it.

Imagine this film done by Ridley Scott........2007-05-11

I remember first time I watched this film in movie theatre when it was released to the first theatrical events, I left the room really disappointed. I felt that Floyd had lost one great opportunity of creating a masterpiece of images and music. By that time we all were still under the impact of Pink Floyd's "The Wall" album a real masterpiece and there was a great expectation about the film, but I have to confess, I had an insight that it wasn't to happen and why I affirm this, because one of the worst experiences I have ever had in my life was my decision of watching the worst film of all times, a film called "Fame" or "Infamous if you like", and guess who was the director of this ridiculous film, yes Alan Parker, so I couldn't expect nothing better from this guy really. Can you all remember good films this guy has been done? Well, no, so do I! It was really a disaster this choice, but how we cannot change what happened, I only can give three stars for the few really good moments this film has, like that of "Goodbye blue sky" and I'm sure this great moments is much more because of the music than the image itself, no, one thing we have to say and recognize "the work of Gerald Scarfe is a real work of genius" he was with Pink Floyd since the creation of the fantastic "The Wall" artwork. Can you all imagine if this film had been done by Ridley Scott with the help of Gerald Scarfe, wow, simply no comments... It would have been a truly masterpiece!

A one hour thirty minute music video.......2007-04-03

And not a great one, by any measure. While I'm sure the Pink Floyd fan boys will slobber all over this and proclaim its genius, the truth is that it's really pretty boring. Random trivial war images, check. Random trivial teen angst and rebellion images, check. Random trivial drug lifestyle images, check. Random trivial imagery of fascist oppression. Hooray! It's paint by numbers anti-establishment. FIGHT THE INSTITUTION! I guess this explains why Pink Floyd zealots have a long standing reputation of excessive drug use, you'd have to be toasted in order to find brilliance here. No dialogue and a non-linear story line makes it so the film is really nothing but a long music video, which like most videos depends on symbolic imagery, and we learn that film isn't Roger Water's medium. Instead of four or five music videos (which is how it would probably be done today) from a solid album, they made one huge video from a concept album. Actually a great idea and quite progressive for the time. But it's still boring. I guess if I'm pressed to say something truly positive about the film, it set a strong precedent that music videos have the potential, as a medium, to do something very special, above and beyond what the song itself could do. That music videos can be something more than just performance/concert videos. Of course, it just showed the potential, it didn't actualize that potential.

Usually, with any criticism of Pink Floyd, you can expect the usual diatribes from the fan base about how you just don't get it, it's over your head, beyond your grasp, blah blah blah, but the sad truth is, there's just nothing here. It's just plain boring.

There's nothing. Well, except maybe we learn that someone in Pink Floyd has serious mommy issues. And even as the film bores you to tears, the music really is fantastic. In fact the music is so great it really does illustrates how they tried so hard, and fell so far short with the film. Buy the album, forget the film! The music alone salvages three stars for this, the album itself rates much higher.

And really, the flower scene? Just lame.

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