DVDS 'Eyes Without a Face' is horrific story

Surgical procedures are depicted in one gruesome scene.
By RANDY A. SALAS
MINNEAPOLIS-ST. PAUL STAR TRIBUNE
Pity poor Christiane. She has a face only a father could love.
Horribly disfigured in a car accident, the title character of Georges Franju's "Eyes Without a Face" broods around the family's country estate hiding behind an expressionless mask. Meanwhile, dad, a brilliant surgeon, and his secretary scour the city for beautiful young women. Their despicable quest: to transplant the unsuspecting victims' unblemished faces onto Christiane to try and restore her former beauty -- again and again until the skin takes without rotting off.
"Smile," Dr. Genenessier prompts Christiane after one attempt, adding quickly, "Not too much."
A new DVD (Criterion, $29.95) of the 1959 French film is a breathtaking departure from the spate of routine fright films that flood the market in advance of Halloween each year. It isn't so much a horror film as it is horrific; its images fester in the memory long after the DVD player has been turned off.
Grisly scene
In particular, viewers will writhe with repulsion during one seemingly unending scene that clinically observes the diabolical doctor's surgical procedures. Moviegoers reportedly fled theaters or fainted during the grisly scene in the film's initial run.
The sequence plays like documentary footage, so clinical in detail with lingering camera shots and minimal editing. It's no surprise that Franju got his start with a documentary, 1949's "Blood of the Beasts," which is included as a supplement on the disc.
He explores the workings of Paris slaughterhouses in dispassionate detail as the men kill and process first a horse and then cattle.
Juxtaposed with this unsettling footage are images of the surrounding city with children playing and lovers embracing, a jarring reminder of how daily life goes on amid the grisly proceedings nearby. It was that lyrical counterpoint, not any particular interest in slaughterhouses, that led Franju to make the documentary, he says in an archival interview on the disc.
Although missing scholarly commentary, a hallmark of Criterion releases, the DVD does include an archival interview with the writers of "Eyes Without a Face" (who also did "Vertigo"), trailers, a gallery of production photos and a few informative essays. The film features newly translated English subtitles, has been nicely restored and is uncut.