Here Is Your Life Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.5
Video		4.5
Audio		5.0
Extras		5.0
Overall		4.5

Here Is Your Life Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov July 30, 2015

Winner of Gold Hugo Award at the Chicago International Film Festival, Jan Troell's "Here Is Your Life" a.k.a. "Här har du ditt liv" (1966) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Criterion. The supplemental features on the disc include new video introduction by director Mike Leigh; new conversation between director Jan Troell and film historian Peter Cowie; new interviews with actor Eddie Axberg and producer and screenwriter Bengt Forslund; and the short film "Interlude in Marshland" (1965). The release also arrives with an illustrated leaflet featuring film scholar Mark Le Fanu's essay "Great Expectations". In Swedish, with optional English subtitles for the main feature. Region-A "locked".

On the road of Life

Initially, 14-year-old Olof (Eddie Axberg, The Emigrants, The New Land) appears shy and reserved. He prefers to observe the world around him and rarely speaks. The boy then suddenly leaves his family behind and goes on the road. He does not know where he is going. All he knows is that he wants to become a man and experience the world.

Deep into the frozen countryside, Olof gets a job in a small mill. Here he is exploited and abused, but the experience only further solidifies his conviction that he was right to leave. Different unfortunate events then force Olof to frequently change jobs, but he treats them as valuable lessons. By the time he is paired with Mr. Larsson (Ulf Palme, Miss Julie), who agrees to teach him how to be a good projectionist, Olof already understands why his country needs a revolution.

While traveling across the country with Mr. Larsson, Olof learns how to crank a Pathe projector, why motion pictures are the shape of things to come, and how to eat and drink like a real gentleman. Later on, while learning about the many benefits artistic life offers, Olof also has a short affair with an older woman (Ulla Sjoblom, The Magician). Olof’s transformation is completed after he gets a new job at a train yard, where he urges the disillusioned local workers to organize themselves and go on strike.

Based on a four-part novel by Nobel Prize winner Eyvind Johnson, Jan Troell’s film Here Is Your Life very much feels like Sweden’s answer to François Truffaut’s The 400 Blows. Even though Troell completed his directorial debut in 1966, exactly seven years after Truffaut had shot his first film, they both have rebellious young protagonists that challenge the status quo of the world they are a part of with similar enthusiasm. Both films are also equally tender and poetic.

Troell’s film, however, has a much more fluid narrative. In fact, various segments in the film freely overlap and create the impression that time has a unique rhythm. Sometimes it slows down and even comes to a complete stop, as if to give Olof a chance to contemplate what his experiences have taught him, and sometimes it speeds up, as if to let him realize that it is better to move on to the next chapter of his education where more valuable lessons await him.

The two films also discover and observe beauty in completely different ways. In The 400 Blows Truffaut finds beauty in the manner in which each morning Paris slowly comes alive and then the chaos gradually changes its streets. Henri Decae’s camera rarely remains still. In Here Is Your Life Troell’s camera routinely marvels nature and its raw beauty and at times it literally feels as if one is viewing extracts from a documentary feature about farm life in the Swedish countryside.

Troell’s film is approximately 168 minutes long -- for a number of years it was the longest film ever produced in Sweden -- and also has a few segments that were shot in color. The music in a few of these rather surreal looking segments is also unusual. Troell used an old gramophone that produced a slightly distorted sound which one would typically expect to hear in early post-silent era films.

Here Is Your Life Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Presented in an aspect ratio of 1.67:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Jan Troell's Here Is Your Life arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Criterion.

The following text appears inside the leaflet provided with this Blu-ray release:

"This new digital transfer was created in 2K resolution on an ARRISCAN film scanner from the 35mm original camera negative. Digital Vision's Nucoda Film Master was used for the color grading, and the restoration was performed using Digital Vision's Phoenix and the Foundry's NUKE. The original monaural soundtrack was remastered at 24-bit from the 17.5mm print master.

Transfer supervisor: Peter Bengtsson/Chimney Pot, Stockholm.
Restoration supervisor: Mats Forsberg/Chimney Pot, Stockholm.
Colorist: Mats Holmgren/Chimney Pot, Stockholm."

If you have seen the various excellent restorations the folks at Chimney Pot did for many of Ingmar Bergman's classic films, then you should have a pretty good idea what type of presentation to expect for Jan Troell's film. Generally speaking, detail and clarity are excellent throughout the entire film. There are only a couple of very small density fluctuations that appear during a few transitions, but the film really looks remarkably healthy and vibrant. Color gradation is impressive as well. The blacks and whites are wonderfully balanced and there is a wide range of nuanced grays that make a number of the outdoor sequences look strikingly rich. There are a few short segments that are in light brown/gray that were carefully desaturated by Jan Troell when he shot the film. Grain is evenly distributed throughout the entire film and there are no compromising sharpening adjustments. Also, there are no large debris, damage marks, cuts, or stains to report in our review. Finally, image stability is excellent. All in all, this is yet another wonderful restoration of a classic Swedish film from the folks at Chimney Pot. (Note: This is a Region-A "locked" Blu-ray release. Therefore, you must have a native Region-A or Reigon-Free Blu-ray payer in order to access its content).

Here Is Your Life Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There is only one standard audio track on this Blu-ray release: Swedish LPCM 1.0. Optional English subtitles are provided for the main feature.

Rather predictably, there is a limited range of nuanced dynamics. Depth and clarity, however, are excellent, and Erik Nordgren's score very easily opens up the film in all the right places. Additionally, it is easy to tell that the audio has been fully remastered because there isn't even a whiff of background hiss. The English translation is excellent.

Here Is Your Life Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Mike Leigh Introduction - acclaimed British director Mike Leigh (Naked, Life Is Sweet) introduces Jan Troell's Here Is Your Life. The introduction was filmed exclusively for Criterion in New York in December 2014. In English, not subtitled. (5 min, 1080p).

• Jan Troell and Peter Cowie - in this new video interview, director, writer, cinematographer, and editor Jan Troell explains how he entered the film business, and discusses his relationship with fellow director Bo Widerberg (All Things Fair), the creative climate in Sweden during the late '50s and early '60s, the short story by Eyvind Johnson that inspired Here Is Your Life, the casting of Max von Sydow, the maturation of Olof Perssonm, the shooting of various sequences, the use of dialog throughout the film, etc. The interview was conducted exclusively for Criterion at the director's home in Sweden in March 2015. In English, not subtitled. (34 min, 1080p).

• Eddie Axberg - in this new video interview, actor Eddie Axberg recalls how he was approached to play Olof Persson, and discusses his character's journey, his interactions with Max von Sydow and Gunnar Björnstrand during the shooting of Here Is Your Life, Jan Troell's working methods, etc. The interview was conducted exclusively for Criterion in Stockholm in March 2015. In Swedish, with optional English subtitles. (16 min, 1080p).

• Bengt Forslund - in this new video interview, Bengt Forslund, who produced and cowrote Here Is Your Life, explains how he contacted director Jan Troell and offered him Eyvind Johnson's short story, and discusses the film's production history and reception (it received rave reviews at the Berlin Film Festival, but the Golden Bear Award went to Roman Polanski's Cul-De-Sac) as well as some of the major trends in Swedish cinema at the time when the film was completed. The interview was conducted exclusively for Criterion in March 2015. In English, not subtitled. (15 min, 1080p).

• Interlude in the Marshland - presented here is a segment from the omnibus film 4 X 4 (1965), which is based on Eyvind Johnson (This Is Your Life) and was directed by Jan Troell. The film was comprised of four short stories, each from a different Nordic country. Interlude in the Marshland a.k.a. Uppehåll i myrlandet stars Allan Edwall, Max von Sydow, and Karl Erik Flens. In Swedish, with optional English subtitles. (31 min, 1080p).

• Leaflet - illustrated leaflet featuring Mark Le Fanu's essay "Great Expectations". (The author teaches at University College London. He also publishes on world cinema in Sight & Sound and Positif).

Here Is Your Life Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Together with the great Bo Widerberg and Vilgot Sjöman, Jan Troell belongs to that special generation of directors that transformed Swedish cinema much like Francois Truffaut, Jean-Luc Godard and the rest of the New Wave directors did in France during the late 1950s and early 1960s. Troell's directorial debut, Here Is Your Life, very much feels like Sweden's answer to Truffaut's first film, The 400 Blows, though stylistically they are quite different. The film has been recently restored in 2K and looks fantastic in high-definition. Criterion's Blu-ray release also comes with a number of new supplements features, including a very informative conversation between the Swedish director and film historian Peter Cowie, that have been produced exclusively for it. VERY HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.