The Tree Of Wooden Clogs
Picture: C+
Sound: C+ Extras: C- Film: B-
Some critics just seem to love a film beyond belief. Ermanno Olmi’s 1978 epic The Tree Of
Wooden Clogs is one of those films.
Originally issued at 185 minutes, Koch Lorber has issued a DVD that has
a shorter 178 minutes long cut. Not
that seven minutes will help my problems with the film, but I always found
hypocrisy in how critics backed this one up.
The film involves a Northern Italian family who send their
child to school at the expense of the farm, with only his property of the title
to help him. When they fail him, the
family needs to get him new ones.
Though that is not what fills three hours altogether, the idea that it
shows life “as it was” with brutal killings of animals for food and the
impoverished conditions is on the Italian Neo-Realist side. So soon after Francis Coppola’s Godfather
films, the constant presence of religion was appealing to those critics as
realistic. Yet, when so much of the
same items surfaced in Michael Cimino’s Heaven’s Gate two years later,
the poor were mocked and the film was desecrated before it got a chance to show
off its narrative innovations. Why
poor-bashing applied to one and not the other is a “fascinating” question that
no one seems to be able to answer.
Here, the narrative is simpler, maybe too simple for the
length. Even with a fine cast and
convincing situations written by Olmi, it tends to drag and there is much that
could have been cut out. The longer
length makes you feel you are there, but this is a film that never worked for
me, as it never reached a peak of making a point all epics are supposed
to. It is ambitious and fulfills some
of its intents, but the reason it is not as discussed these days is not because
it is just out on DVD now, but because it simply does not hold up against other
films of its ilk. The Tree Of Wooden
Clogs is still a good film. I just
wish I knew what was missing from this copy, but there are some fine moments
nonetheless.
Olmi was also the cinematographer and the film is
presented here in a 1.33 X 1 full frame format, though it may or may not be
missing information on the sides. The
transfer is a bit dated, looking like a professional NTSC analog master, but it
needs a better transfer. This will do,
as will the Dolby Digital 2.0, which is barely stereo. I also thought the use of music, especially
familiar songs, never clicked or worked.
The only extras are a stills gallery, a trailer for the film and for six
other Koch Lorber DVD titles.
- Nicholas Sheffo
