The British Film Institute will release on Blu-ray director Max Ophüls' film
Madame de... (1953), starring Charles Boyer, Danielle Darrieux, Vittorio De Sica, Jean Debucourt, and Jean Galland. The release will be available for purchase on May 22.
Supplemental features for this upcoming release have not yet been finalized.
Synopsis: When, beset by debt, the titular Countess Louise (Danielle Darrieux) decides to sell a pair of earrings that were a wedding gift from her husband André (Charles Boyer), she unwittingly sets in motion a chain of events that will have serious consequences not only for the Parisian couple but for André's mistress and for an Italian Baron (Vittorio De Sica), who purchased the, by then, much-travelled jewellery. Featuring nuanced performances by all three lead actors and directed by celebrated auteur Max Ophüls, this intricately constructed and elegantly designed drama is a searing study of fateful passion wound up in deceits, deals and desires.
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Also on May 22, the British Film Institute will release on Blu-ray Alan Clarke's film
Rita, Sue and Bob Too (1987), starring Siobhan Finneran, Michelle Holmes, and George Costigan.
Synopsis: Following an acclaimed career in hard-hitting TV drama, director Alan Clarke achieved a cinema hit with his much-loved comedy. Bradford teenagers Rita and Sue regularly babysit for successful couple Bob and Michelle, whose comfortable suburban lifestyle contrasts with their own bleak existence. One evening when Bob is taking them home, he suggests a detour to the moors. Impressed by his flashy car and worldly ways the girls are smooth-talked into a three-way sexual relationship that becomes very much part of their lives. At first it's a bit of a laugh but people are quick to point the finger and the affair is soon out in the open.
The screenplay was adapted from a series of acclaimed plays by Andrea Dunbar, which were based on her own upbringing on Bradford's Buttershaw estate. The contrast of bawdy laughs with astute social comment results in one of the more memorable and enduring British films from the period.