Underground

The winner of the Palme d'Or at the 1995 Cannes Film Festival, Underground begins in gloriously frenetic fashion, with an extended shot of a brass band running full-tilt-boogie across a war-torn landscape for no apparent reason, playing a maddeningly catchy tune. If you were feeling drowsy when you sat down, trust me, you're wide awake now...and Kusturica doesn't let go of your lapels for the next three hours. The movie is divided into three asymmetrical parts, the most compelling being the middle one, which features a bold allegorical conceit in which Marko (Kusturica regular Miki Manojlovic) neglects to tell his pal Blackie (Lazar Ristovski), and a host of others who are hiding in a basement bunker, that WWII is in fact over, instead using them as unwitting tools in his own rise to industrial power by selling the weapons that they manufacture in their effort to defeat Germans who'd left town decades previously. This is absurd, of course, but that's beside the point; as an outrageous fable, it works, largely because Kusturica and his cast run roughshod over any potential objections. Despite its three-hour length, Underground rarely provides any opportunity for you to catch your breath. Recommended. (M. D'Angelo)[DVD Review--Jan. 26, 2004--New Yorker, 167 min., not rated, $29.95--Making its debut on DVD, the 1995 foreign hit Underground features a sharp, handsome transfer, and a three-minute post-Cannes screening interview with the director. Bottom line: although slim on extras, this critic and audience favorite is well worth picking up on DVD.][Blu-ray/DVD Review—Mar. 6, 2018—Kino Lorber, 3 discs, 170 min., not rated, DVD: $39.95, Blu-ray: $44.95—Making its latest appearance on DVD and debut on Blu-ray, 1995’s Underground features a fine transfer with DTS-HD 5.1 sound on the Blu-ray release. Extras include the six-part TV version “Once Upon a Time There Was a Country” (327 min.), the 1996 “making-of” documentary “Shooting Days” (75 min.), behind-the-scenes footage with cast and crew interviews (36 min.), and a booklet featuring an essay by Giorgio Bertellini. Bottom line: this foreign classic debuts on Blu-ray with an excellent set of extras.]