The Night Porter Details

1974

Rated:
60
from 1822 members

Starring	Dirk Bogarde, Charlotte Rampling
Director	Liliana Cavani
Genres	Drama, World Cinema

The Night Porter

The Night Porter is one of the most provocative and haunting films ever made. Dirk Bogarde gives a characteristically charismatic performance as a former Gestapo officer who has escaped his past by becoming the Night Porter of a hotel in Vienna. Guilt and remorse flood back when he meets Lucia (Charlotte Ramplping), his former lover with whom he shared a bizarre sado-masochistic relationship in the concentration camp where he was master and she was captive. Their relationship is rekindled, but they are surrounded by former Gestapo officers who will stop their clandestine affair, at any cost. The Night Porter is a brilliant account of a love born out of hatred and furtive passion.

Starring	Dirk Bogarde, Charlotte Rampling
Director	Liliana Cavani
Studio	ANCHOR BAY HOME ENTERTAINMENT
Run time	DVD: 1 hr 48 mins
Certificate
Genres	Drama, World Cinema
Language	DVD: German, Italian
Subtitles	DVD: English
Released	DVD: 18 Sep 2006 Production year: 1974
Format	DVD

Critics' reviews of The Night Porter
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Like Last Tango in Paris, an operatic celebration of sexual disgust, set in 1957 in a Viennese hotel where Bogarde... read more on Time Out
- Time Out
- Posted 04 Nov 2008
Most helpful member's review of The Night Porter
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12 out of 17 people found this review helpful

Dreadful quality print

The film is dated, but still holds its own. What is unforgivable though is the quality of the telecine. It looks like a really poor NTSC VHS dub - smeary and unwatchable. Shame on you Anchor Bay!
- - Philip Beasley from Essex, ENgland
  - Posted 15 Nov 2006 02:03
Most recent members' review of The Night Porter
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2 out of 2 people found this review helpful

Customer Review

We have the Criterion DVD version of Night Porter, but this version got such good reviews that we thought we'd rent it to compare. We've just watched selected bits of this one (Starz, but apparently Anchor Bay) side-by-side with the Criterion edition on a big projection system.

First off: the Anchor Bay version is anamorphic and the Criterion version isn't. BUT anamorphic is only worthwhile if the underlying quality justifies it. In this case the non-anamorphic Criterion transfer knocks spots off the anamorphic Anchor Bay transfer. And Anchor Bay seem to have messed with the contrast and color balance horribly. I know I'm sounding like a DVD geek here: I never realized such things could matter so much. But, viewed side-by-side, the Anchor Bay version is MUCH flatter: the all-important facial expressions and emotions come over much better on the Criterion version.

There is a flip side. The Anchor Bay version has interviews with Liliana Cavani and the producer (I forget his name) which are quite interesting. But also it has an interview with Charlotte Rampling which is absolutely fabulous: she tells how Dirk Bogarde had had the script for years, but looked at it again after he saw one of Cavani's other films; how he told Cavani he'd like to do it, but only with Rampling as his co-star; and how she felt about many of the film's most iconic moments. This is unmissable stuff.

So there are swings and roundabouts here. On the whole I'd recommend doing what we did: buy the Criterion version, but rent the Anchor Bay one just for the interviews.
- - A customer from UK
  - Posted 23 Jun 2008 15:22
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