Ken Russell: The Great Passions on Blu-ray and DVD [read more]
What is art?
These three spectacular documentaries by controversial director Ken Russell (Valentino, The Devils) were originally broadcast in the BBC TV arts documentary strands Monitor and Omnibus in the 1960s.
On 28 March 2016 they will be released together on DVD and Blu-ray in a Dual Format Edition by the BFI. Among the many extras, each film has an audio commentary, and in a new interview, film editor Michael Bradsell talks about working with Ken Russell.
Always on Sunday (1965), a dramatised exploration of the naif painter Henri Rousseau, sees Russell reunited with Melvyn Bragg and Oliver Reed in one of his most charming and delightful documentaries. Isadora (1966), Russell’s exuberant study of the outrageous American dancer Isadora Duncan, is probably the film that best encapsulates the director’s attitude to art and creativity. In Dante's Inferno (1967) Oliver Reed gives a smouldering performance as the Pre-Raphaelite poet and painter, Dante Gabriel Rossetti. This startling and bold film is one of the most ambitious that Russell made for the BBC.
