Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #39463 in DVD

Customer Reviews

"Viva Zapata" DVD from World_Acoustic
Since I ordered this DVD from world_acoustic, I have been emailed and asked by them to up-grade my initial two-star rating of their service to one more suitable to their liking and established reputation with Amazon.com. I will do nothing of the kind. This is a two-star treatment of a four-star film.
Perhaps world_acoustic is more knowledgeable of Internet marketing than it is with respecting the quality of a film classic such as "Viva Zapata." I ordered this DVD from world_acoustic through Amazon.com. As a collector of such classic films, I have spent a number of years searching for this and other film classics in DVD format on the Internet. I was initially impressed that world_acoustic had made this excellent film available on DVD. That began to change when I received the DVD.
I was reluctant to open the DVD after receiving it because the cover indicated the language of the film was Italian with Korean subtitles. Some of the graphics on the DVD cover were in Korean. After contacting world_acoustic by email, I was assured the DVD was in English. It was. But other disappointments followed.
Opening credits and the on-screen storyline which establishes the setting of the film had both been edited out.
Of the more than 25-30 separate scenes in the film, the entire film is broken down into only six scenes on the interactive menu of the DVD.
The most dispicable treatment of this DVD distributed by world_acoustic is in its ending. The white horse, and its symbolic significance to the main character (Emiliano Zapata) throughout the film, is completely edited out by the elimination of the closing scene. By this act of cinematic bufoonery, world_acoustic and/or its distributor, accomplishes, through computer editing, what the Mexican army in the film could not.
The survival of the white horse and its return to the revolutionaries' strongholds in the mountainside, is meant as a symbol of the peasants' on-going struggle. The survival of the white horse is also meant as an enduring visual motif in the film that answers the question of Zapata's martydom to his people.
Instead, the ending of this film on the DVD distributed by world_acoustic ends in a freeze frame on the seemingly leaderless Mexican peasant farmers and fades to black
-eliminating the reappearance of the white horse as well as the closing credits. I don't think Elia Kazan would approve of the way world_acoustic and its distributor mistreated his work.
Perhaps if world_acoustic distributed a DVD that showed Moses receiving only six of the commandments, or showed only three gunmen being recruited by Yul Brynner to protect a Mexican village, could it out-do itself for the manner in which it misrepresents "Viva Zapata."
I am so dissatisfied with this DVD, I am returning it to world_acoustic. I would like Amazon.com to know, as a regular and registered customer, it is very unlikely I will be making any future purchases of any merchandise from world_acoustic.

poor editing of the film
the dvd that i recieved through AmaZon was poorly edited. both the beginning and the end of the movie was cut off. I had seen this picture years ago and remember it very well.I will not return it since i didnt pay very much for it.The dvd was distributed through Sam Luu.

A True Story of Mexican Revolution.
Actually this was the film that triggered my interest on the Mexican Revolution.
I've seen it many times and always found new details to take into account. As I read more and more on the subject my appreciation of this movie increases.
It presents the viewer with a big fresco of the Revolution that convulsed that country for more than ten years.
I admire the strange capacity of the film to show condensed in each scene, many key issues of why and how the Revolution exploded and continue growing along the years, with an immitigable fire.

Director Elia Kazan has been criticized for his appearance on the Un-American Activities Committee that lead many people related to cinematography to be ostracized.
This been said, regardless of his political stand, he had directed many great Oscar winner films as: "Gentleman's Agreement" (1947), "Streetcar Named Desire" (1951); "East of Eden" (1955); "Splendor on the Grass" (1961) and the present "Viva Zapata!" (1952).
He had directed two "Movie Icons" as Marlon Brando (more than once) and James Dean obtaining the best from them. All his films explored the inner depth of human soul with unflinching stare.

Since the first shot, showing a very accurate characterization of President Porfirio Diaz (Fay Roope) and giving an inkling of the type of ruler he was, an enormous gallery of Mexican historical figure are made known.
Francisco Madero's (Harold Gordon) personality and idealistic naïveté is depicted with very few strokes.
Huerta's (Frank Silvera) wickedness and treachery is shown too.

Above all of them Emiliano Zapata's figure impersonated by an inspired Marlon Brando stands with an epic height. His ideals, stubbornness, charisma and internal sorrows leading him to the final sacrifice, are shown convincingly.

A special mention must be done of Anthony Quinn's superb performance, which entitled him to win the Oscar. He not only has the physique du role, but an internal conviction to give flesh to Eufemio, Zapata's brother, a semi cultured and brave centaur, product of his times and environment.

Josefa (Jean Peters) the fiancée and later wife of Emiliano shows all the traits of a high middle class woman romantically requested by a rural hero. The scene played with Brando in the church's atrium is wonderful.
The only character that gives a discordant note is the fictional Fernando, representing an addict to revolution for revolution in itself.

Joseph MacDonald's black and white photography is very beautiful. Steinbeck's screenplay has a solid internal coherence that shows all along the film.

A Classic Movie not diminished by the more than fifty years passed.
Reviewed by Max Yofre.