Finally! Legit DVD coming 7/15/14
For years available only on nearly unwatchable bootleg DVDs from public domain hell, The North Star finally gets a decent release from Olive Films on July 15, 2014. The disc also includes the revamped 1957 version, Armored Attack!.
It'll be available on both DVD (SRP $24.99) and Blu-ray ($29.99).
Curiously, the original film is actually listed as the co-feature to Armored Attack!, which is the main title shown on the DVD and Blu-ray. However, both films are included in full (The North Star at 106 minutes and Armored Attack! at 76 minutes).
The North Star has been rightly criticized as a stultifying, dishonest piece of pro-Soviet propaganda (just as its spin-off is a clumsily reworked bit of anti-Soviet propaganda), but it does have some powerful moments between its political comment and ridiculous musical numbers (in a war film!). It's a fascinating relic of its era that deserves to be seen and discussed...hopefully, maturely and without the usual idiotic ideological polemics.
Here are details from the release itself:
SYNOPSIS:
When the school year ends, five friends from a small Ukrainian village decide to travel to Kiev. Their trip is cut short when German aircraft attack and their town falls under occupation. While many escape to the hills to form an anti-Nazi resistance group, a German doctor, Dr. Otto Von Harden (Erich von Stroheim), begins to use the children for medical experiments and as sources of blood transfusions for wounded German soldiers.
Directed by Lewis Milestone (All Quiet on the Western Front), this story of valiant resistance stars Dana Andrews (Laura), Anne Baxter (All About Eve), and Walter Huston (The Treasure of Sierra Madre) as the Russian doctor who discovers the nefarious German plot.
In 1943,The North Star was nominated for six Academy Awards and was later re-released in the midst of the Cold War as Armored Attack! (1957). The original references to the allied Russian military were excised and an overtly anti-Communist narration track was added. This disc includes the original theatrical cut, The North Star, which runs 30 minutes (106 min.) longer and preserves Milestone's initial version of the film before these politically-motivated changes were made.
BONUS FEATURE:
* Radio Adaptation: On January 3, 1944, Screen Guild Theater (CBS) broadcast this half-hour radio adaptation of The North Star, with Walter Huston, Anne Baxter, Farley Granger and Jane Withers all reprising their roles from the film