François Truffaut's Jules et Jim Getting BFI Blu-ray Release

In January we shared with you the news that François Truffaut’s hugely popular classic Jules et Jim was set for a re-release from BFI. In February the film had it’s s UK theatrical release via BFI Distribution, it comes to Blu-ray in a new 2K restoration, released by the BFI later this month.

Starting just before the Great War and spanning three decades, François Truffaut’s hugely popular classic depicts one of cinema’s most captivating love triangles, between two best friends – the Austrian Jules (Oskar Werner) and the French Jim (Henri Serre) – and the object of their mutual desire, the enigmatic and alluring Catherine, played with verve and sensitivity by Jeanne Moreau.

Fast, funny and stylish, Jules et Jim is a deeply affecting and engaging testament to love, loyalty and freedom, and remains a highly influential landmark of world cinema.

In the bohemian Paris of 1912, two aspiring writers form a close friendship: Jules (Oskar Werner) is a shy, philosophical Austrian, while Jim (Henri Serre) is a debonair Frenchman, confident and successful with women. Both fall for the beautiful, capricious Catherine (Jeanne Moreau), but Jules is the one she chooses to marry. After the Great War – in which Jules and Jim fight on opposite sides – Jim visits his two friends and their young daughter in the Rhine Valley, but the marriage is not what it seems, and Jim soon finds himself embroiled in a complex, turbulent ménage à trois. Catherine yearns for free and passionate love, devoid of jealousy, lies and hypocrisy. As her lovers acknowledge, she is “a vision for all men, not a woman for one”.

Special features
-Presented in High Definition from a new 2K restoration
-Audio commentary with Jeanne Moreau and Serge Toubiana (106 mins, 2000)
-François Truffaut panel discussion (2022, 54 mins): film scholars Pasquale Iannone, Marilyn Mallia, Sonali Joshi, Ginette Vincendeau and Catherine Wheatley discuss key themes and influences in Truffaut’s work
-The John Player Lecture: François Truffaut (c1972, 53 mins, audio): the director discusses his films
-Jeanne Moreau in Conversation (1982, 83 mins, audio): the Jules et Jim star talks with Don Allen about her life and career
-Screen Epiphanies: John Hurt on Jules et Jim (2010, 8 mins): the actor on his first viewing of the film and the lasting impression it has left on him
-Trailers
-Stills gallery
*** First pressing only*** Illustrated booklet with essays by Pasquale Iannone and Lillian Crawford; a contemporary review from Monthly Film Bulletin, a biography of Francois Truffaut, credits and notes on the special features.

France / 1962 / black and white / 106 mins / French, German and English language, with English subtitles / original aspect ratio 2.35:1 // BD50: 1080p, 24fps, PCM 2.0 mono audio (48kHz/24-bit)