Rating summary

Movie		4.5
Video		2.5
Audio		5.0
Extras		2.5
Overall		2.5

Diary of a Lost Girl Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov October 16, 2015

Georg Wilhelm Pabst's "Tagebuch einer Verlorenen" a.k.a. "Diary of a Lost Girl" (1929) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Video. The supplemental features on the disc include an audio commentary by Thomas Gladysz, director of the Louise Brooks Society; Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle's short film "Windy Riley Goes Hollywood" (1931); and promotional trailer. With German intertitles and optional English subtitles. Region-A "locked".

The girl

The young and naïve Thymian (the beautiful Louise Brooks, Pandora's Box) is seduced by an older man (Fritz Rasp, Metropolis [Reconstructed & Restored]) who has been hired to assist her father (Josef Rovenský, Manja Valewska) in his pharmacy. When Thymian gives birth to his child, she is asked to marry him so that her family’s reputation would remain unblemished. But Thymian openly rejects the older man.

The rebellious act angers Thymian’s relatives and she is promptly sent to a strict reform school.

Meanwhile, Thymian’s father begins a relationship with the ambitious maid Meta (Franziska Kinz, An Enemy of the People), who quickly tricks the old man to believe that they were meant to spend the rest of their lives together. Eventually, he marries her and she becomes the new master of his house.

In the reform school Thymian is visited by Count Nicolas Osdorff (André Roanne, The Five Cents of Lavarede), a relative who has also been rejected by his wealthy father (Arnold Korff, The Haunted Castle). Count Nicolas convinces Thymian that she would never be accepted back in her family and that she must begin a new life alone. Shortly after, assisted by her good friend Erika (Edith Meinhard), Thymian runs away. The beautiful girl then ends up in a popular brothel, where she learns that in the real world everything and everyone has a price. Years later, at a large party she meets her father, his wife and his assistant.

It isn’t difficult to see why Georg Wilhelm Pabst was forced by the censors to edit Diary of a Lost Girl -- its observations and concerns feel strikingly modern. For example, when the beautiful Thymian is raped by the older man and becomes pregnant, her family decides to cover up the crime with a marriage that will protect its public image. There is a deeply disturbing logic behind the decision – which is that as long as the rapist and his victim are officially declared a couple, the society they are a part of does not see anything wrong with the hideous act that has brought them together.

The dubious moral standards of the time are targeted again after Thymian enters the brothel. As strange as it may sound, this is the only place where ‘respectable’ men honestly declare their intentions and the women have the power to choose. It is s a microcosm of the world that will eventually replace the one Thymian and the rest of the girls live in – here there are no masks (unless a customer requests them), there are no class restrictions, and money can most certainly buy happiness.

The film ends with a hugely pretentious sequence in which Thymian utters the right words and then exits the reform school she has been invited to visit with a group of respectable ladies, but it was not the finale Pabst had in mind.

Brooks looks strikingly elegant. Her sudden transformation in the brothel before she meets her first client is the film’s highlight. (The dresses and hats are superb. Also, pay attention to the stylish shoes the women wear).

Eureka Entertainment’s release presents Diary of Lost Girl with an excellent piano score performed by Javier Perez de Azpeitia. It includes fragments from classical pieces by Scriabin, Schumann, Chopin, and Ghlinka, amongst others.

Diary of a Lost Girl was recently reconstructed and restored in 2K by Fondazione Cineteca di Bologna, the Deutsche Filminstitut -- DIF, Frankfurt am Main, and the Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung, Wiesbaden. The scanning and digital mastering of Diary of a Lost Girl was carried out at Omnimago, Gmbh, Ingelheim, Germany.

Diary of a Lost Girl Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Presented in an aspect ratio of 1.28:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Georg Wilhelm Pabst's Diary of a Lost Girl arrives on Blu-ray courtesy Kino Video.

The release is sourced from the same 2K restoration of Diary of a Lost Girl which British distributors Eureka Entertainment accessed when they prepared their release of the film in 2014. Unfortunately, here the framing is problematic. Indeed, there is some unusual stretching that is present throughout the entire film. During close-ups, in particular, it is very easy to see that Louise Brooks' face does not look right. To see the effect, compare screencapture #10 and screencapture #9 from our review of the Region-B release. Another good example can also be seen in screencapture #15. I am unsure exactly how the stretching was introduced, but the basic framing also reveals a discrepancy (1.28:1 for the Kino release vs. 1.33:1 for the Region-B release). The other basic characteristics of the presentation are very good. Excluding the various inherited source limitations -- such as occasional density fluctuations, minor transition issues, and age-related imperfections -- the film looks as good as it can. (Note: This is a Region-A "locked" Blu-ray release. Therefore, you must have a native Region-A or Region-Free player in order to access its content).

Diary of a Lost Girl Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There is only one standard audio track on this Blu-ray release: Music LPCM 2.0. Optional English subtitles are provided for the German intertitles.

The same very beautiful piano score performed by Javier Perez de Azpeitia is included on this release (it also appears on the Region-B release). It includes fragments from classical pieces by Scriabin, Schumann, Chopin, and Ghlinka, amongst others. The quality of the audio is outstanding. Also, there are no audio dropouts or distortions to report in our review.

Diary of a Lost Girl Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Promotional Trailer - promotional trailer for Diary of a Lost Girl. Music only. (1 min, 1080p).

• Windy Riley Goes Hollywood - this short film was directed by Roscoe 'Fatty' Arbuckle (credited as William Goodrich) in 1931. It is based on a story by Ken Kling and stars Louise Brooks, Jack Shutta, William B. Davidson, and Wilbur Mack. In English, not subtitled. (20 min, 1080p).

• Audio Commentary - Thomas Gladysz, director of the Louise Brooks Society, discusses the ambiguous nature of Georg Wilhelm Pabst's Diary of a Lost Girl, the film's visual style and its impressionistic aura, the relationships between the main characters, interesting details from the lives and careers of some of the principal actors, etc.

Diary of a Lost Girl Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Kino Video's upcoming Blu-ray release of Georg Wilhelm Pabst's Diary of a Lost Girl is sourced from the same 2K restoration of the film which was initially accessed by Eureka Entertainment in the United Kingdom for their local release. However, there is some unusual stretching that is present throughout the entire film. I am unsure exactly how the stretching was introduced, but during close-ups of Louise Brooks' face it is easy to see and quite distracting. At the moment, I don't know if the issue is present only on my disc.