After establishing himself as a master filmmaker, Roberto Rossellini departed briefly from his familiar milieu to create a series of historical dramas for television. These oft-overlooked projects--BLAISE PASCAL, THE AGE OF THE MEDICI, and CARTESIUS--capture some of the West’s most important minds and moments in all of their gritty details (in keeping with Realist tradition, Rossellini resists dressing up the past in exaggerated finery). Each of these historical programs is included here in full, along with commentary by Rossellini biographer Tag Gallagher.

DVD Features:

3-Disc Set
Keep Case
Full Frame - 1.33
Audio:
Dolby Digital 1.0 - French
Subtitles - English - Optional
Text/Photo Galleries:
Additional Text: Notes
Features:
1. Blaise Pascal
2. The Age of The Medici
3. Rene Descartes: CARTESIUS Mathematician, Scientist, and Writer

Distributor Notes: In the final phase of his career, Italian master Roberto Rossellini embarked on a dramatic, daunting project: a series of politically minded televisions films about knowledge and history, made in an effort to teach, where the contemporary media was failing. Looking at the western world's major figures and moments, yet focusing on the small details of daily life, Rossellini was determined not to recount history but to bring it back to life, as it might have been, unadorned yet full of the drama of the everyday. In this selection of Rossellini's history films, Eclipse presents Blaise Pascal, the three-part The Age of the Medici, and Cartesius--works that don't just enliven the past but illuminate the ideas that brought us to where we are.

Source: Image Entertainment Inc.

Roberto Rossellini: Italian Director/Screenwriter