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On The Bowery - The Films of Lionel Rogosin, Vol. 1 [Blu-ray]

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The Blu-Ray and DVD editions contain two feature films: ON THE BOWERY and GOOD TIMES, WONDERFUL TIMES as well as Rogosin's "lost" film, OUT.

For songwriter Woody Guthrie, his guitar was a machine that "kills fascists." For Lionel Rogosin, the weapon of choice was a movie camera, and his first battle was waged on the streets of New York City.

Exploring the underworld of the city's skid row, Rogosin developed his signature style. After months drinking with men he met on the Bowery, Rogosin worked with his buddies to write a screenplay that reflected their lives--and then cast them as themselves. This technique of making films "from the inside" allowed Rogosin to film ordinary people caught up in universal problems. His films explored alcoholism, homelessness, racial discrimination, war, labor conflict, and poverty with great compassion and honesty.

On the Bowery chronicles three days in the drinking life of Ray Salyer, a part-time railroad worker adrift on New York's skid row. When the film opened it 1956, it exploded on the screen, burning away years of Hollywood artifice, jump-starting the post-war American independent film movement and earning an Oscar nomination. Now gloriously restored by the Cineteca di Bologna, On the Bowery is both an incredible document of a bygone era and a vivid and devastating portrait of addiction that resonates today just as it did when it was made.

Good Times, Wonderful Times was Rogosin's powerful response to militarism and fascism. For two years, Rogosin traveled to twelve countries, amassing footage of war atrocities from national archives. He then interspersed these harrowing images with scenes of a London cocktail party's inane chatter. The juxtaposition satirizes the tragic irresponsibility of modern man. Good Times, Wonderful Times, released at the height of the Vietnam conflict, became one of the great antiwar films of the era.

Out, a documentary by Rogosin made for the United Nations, tells the plight of Hungarian refugees fleeing to Austria in the aftermath of the Hungarian Revolution of 1956.

The collection features:
1. On the Bowery. Directed by Lionel Rogosin. United States. 1956. Mono sound. Aspect ratio 4:3. Restoration by the Cineteca del Comune di Bologna. Mastered from the 2K restoration. (65.00)
2. Introduction by Martin Scorsese. Produced for Milestone's release.
3. The Perfect Team: The Making of "On the Bowery." Directed by Michael Rogosin. (46:30).
4. A Walk Through the Bowery. Directed by Michael Rogosin. (12:12).
5. Street of Forgotten Men. United States. 1933. Courtesy of Oddball Film + Video, San Francisco (2:12).
6. Bowery Men's Shelter. Directed by Rhody Streeter and Tony Ganz. United States. 1972. Courtesy of New York Public Library Film and Video Collection. Restored by Colorlab. (10:19).
7. On the Bowery. Theatrical Trailer (2:12).
8. Good Times, Wonderful Times. Directed by Lionel Rogosin. England/United States. 1964. Aspect ratio 4:3. Restoration by the Cineteca del Comune di Bologna. Mastered from the 2K restoration. (69.00)
9. Man's Peril: The Making of "Good Times, Wonderful Times." Directed by Michael Rogosin. (24:15)
10. Out. Directed by Lionel Rogosin. 1957. United States. Aspect Ratio 4:3. Courtesy of United Nations Multimedia Resources Unit. (25:33).