The Fifth Horseman is Fear Blu-ray

British label Second Run will add to its Blu-ray catalog Zbynek Brynych's The Fifth Horseman is Fear (1965), starring Miroslav Machácek, Olga Scheinpflugová, Zdenka Procházková, Jirí Adamíra, and Josef Vinklár. The release will be available for purchase on August 30.

Description: A Jewish physician in Nazi-occupied Prague is compelled to work cataloguing the homes and possessions of his countrymen as they are displaced to designated ghettos. When he helps an injured resistance fighter, he is plunged into a moral and ethical dilemma, and begins a nightmarish odyssey to help save the man.

Focusing on the intense anxiety, paranoia and terror prevalent in a fascist state, Zbyněk Brynych's The Fifth Horseman is Fear subverts its historical context, creating an expressionistic, thinly disguised allegory about communist Czechoslovakia – or indeed living under any totalitarian system - that is richly atmospheric and frighteningly real.

Special Features and Technical Specs:

• NEWLY REMASTERED BY THE CZECH NATIONAL FILM ARCHIVE
• A newly-recorded Projection Booth audio commentary with Kat Ellinger, Jonathan Owen and Mike White
• Two 'lost' sequences: the Italian Prologue, and the notorious Nazi brothel sequence that appeared in the 1968 American and Italian release versions of the film
• Žalm (1966) - a short film by the renowned Czech filmmaker Evald Schorm to commemorate the tragic destiny of the Jewish people
• 20-page booklet with new writing on the film by Jonathan Owen
• New English subtitle translation