British director Peter Greenaway followed his international arthouse hit The Draughtsman’s Contract with A Zed & Two Noughts (1985). On 23 August this extraordinary tale of obsession is released by the BFI in a new High Definition transfer on Blu-ray and includes a full feature commentary with the director.
A car collides with a swan outside a zoo. Two women passengers die but the driver, Alba Bewick survives with a leg amputation. Obsessed with the accident, the zoologist husbands of the dead women – twins Oliver and Oswald – become fascinated by the processes of decay and embark on an affair with the amputee. As dead animals decompose to the playful rhythms of Michael Nyman, symmetry is elevated beyond obsession, and Sascha Vierny’s cinematography pays homage to Vermeer.
Full of surprises and magnificent conundrums, Peter Greenaway’s third feature is as perversely comic and teasing as it is shocking.
This Blu-ray release also includes a Peter Greenaway short, The Sea in Their Blood (1983), a rarely seen COI film exploring Britain’s coastline, with music by Michael Nyman.
