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List Price: $24.96Amazon.com's Price: $20.99 You Save: $3.97 (16%)as of 11/24/2009 13:05 EST details
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Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Audience Rating: Unrated
Binding: DVD
Brand: Sony
EAN: 0043396259195
Format: Color, DVD, NTSC
Label: Sony Pictures
Languages: EnglishOriginal Language
Manufacturer: Sony Pictures
MPN: COLD25919D
Number Of Items: 2
Publisher: Sony Pictures
Region Code: 99
Release Date: January 06, 2009
Running Time: 210 minutes
Studio: Sony Pictures
Theatrical Release Date: 1969
Editorial Review:
Product Description:
Studio: Sony Pictures Home Ent Release Date: 01/06/2009
Amazon.com:
A true marvel, A Matter of Life and Death is one of the best films by the storied English filmmaking team known as the Archers: Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. Among other felicities, this 1946 fantasy has one of the most crackling opening ten minutes of any movie you'll ever see: after a deceptively dreamy prologue, we are thrown into the conversation between an airman (David Niven) whose torched plane is about to crash in the English Channel, and an American military radio operator (Kim Hunter) operating the radio on the ground. Their touching exchange, made urgent by his imminent death, is breathtakingly visualized (you have never seen a WWII plane interior quite as vividly as this). What follows is glorious: Niven's death has been missed by an otherworldly collector (Marius Goring)--all that thick English fog, you know--and so he gets to argue his case for life before a heavenly tribunal. The heaven sequences are in pearly black-and-white, the earthly material in stunning Technicolor (the color is the cause of a particularly good in-joke). The Powell-Pressburger brief on behalf of humanity is both romantic and witty, and the wonderful cast is especially enriched by Roger Livesey (the star of Powell and Pressburger's The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp), as a doctor with a camera obscura and an enormous heart.
Age of Consent, the other film in this two-disc set, comes from a much later period in Powell's career--indeed, close to the end of it. Made on a low budget in Australia in 1969, the movie depicts a disenchanted painter (James Mason) finding renewal in the isolation of an island and the beauty of the young woman (Helen Mirren) who models for him. The salt-and-pepper authority of Mason and the nubile freshness of Mirren give pleasure, although the theme is too on-the-nose (and Jack MacGowran's comic relief too broad) for a really subtle take on Powell's part. Extras include a seven-minute Martin Scorsese comment for AMOLAD, and a commentary track on that film by Powell-Pressburger authority Ian Christie; Scorsese chimes in again for Age of Consent, as does Helen Mirren, whose memories of her first movie are specific and fond. Kent Jones contributes the commentary track, a 10-minute interview with underwater photographers Ron and Valerie Taylor includes some Mirren comments, and a 16-minute making-of documentary gives some flavor of the set, including the memories of Powell's son Kevin. --Robert Horton
Average Rating: 
Rating:  -
The Age of Consent is something of a nudie flick, pointless, and dull. Mirren looks better with her clothes on. Stairway to Heaven starts out well and then becomes a loooong series of sermons based upon a truly absurd view of heaven, justice, and love. Yes, I know: these pictures are lauded by critics and shown in art theaters and "fillum studies" courses. Please, spare yourself the expense and boredom.
Rating:  -
Some years ago I managed to get a VHS NTSC version. However, finally "A Matter of Life and Death" is available on DVD, Region 1, albeit as a double feature 2-DVD set.
The movie speaks for itself (and others have described it well), but this DVD version has superb visual quality, though there is a faint, but noticeable fluctuation in the color saturation at times; certainly no dust marks or scratches can be seen. Sound is excellent, but as others have pointed out, the English subtitles ... Read More
Rating: -
STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN .I BET THE COEN BROTHERS AND P.T.ANDERSON HAVE SEEN THIS MOVIE..,MORE THAN ONCE.:AT 58 I DONT KNOW HOW I MISSED THIS ONE.. SIMPLY THE BEST MOVIE I'D NEVER SEEN UNTIL RECENTLY ON A DIGITAL TV STATION..WENT ON AMAZON AND BOUGHT THIS NEWER AND APPARENTLY BEST DVD..I'VE ASKED A NUMBER OF FRIENDS ALL IN THERE FIFTYS, MAYBE 1 IN 4 HAD HEARD OF IT.BUY IT OR NET FLIX IT THIS NEWER PRINT IS A MUST..
Rating:  -
I think the original title, 'A Matter of Life and Death', is far more explicit than the North American, 'Stairway to Heaven'.
The first time I saw the film I was in my early teens and felt it offered a far more interesting view of an 'after-life' than the vague religious idea the church tried to depict.
In 1949 while serving with the RAF I flew on a liaison mission with the USAAF. We landed at Los Angeles and during our brief stay were entertained by Hollywood. I met ... Read More
Rating: -
In this review I am commenting on The Stairway To Heaven.
Such an excellent movie! The storyline is wonderful, the acting is good, the photography excellent, and for the year that the movie was made, the "special effects", if you will, was very well done.
This movie has had a very powerful effect on me. I first saw it as a very young kid and I never forgot it. While David Niven is the main actor, the role of the doctor with the beard was a character whom I was deeply influenced ... Read More
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