A singular work in film history, Chantal Akerman’s Jeanne Dielman, 23, quai du Commerce, 1080 Bruxelles meticulously details, with a sense of impending doom, the daily routine of a middle-aged widow (Delphine Seyrig)—whose chores include making the beds, cooking dinner for her son, and turning the occasional trick. In its enormous spareness, Akerman’s film seems simple, but it encompasses an entire world. Whether seen as an exacting character study or one of cinema’s most hypnotic and complete depictions of space and time, Jeanne Dielman is an astonishing, compelling movie experiment, one that has been analyzed and argued over for decades.BLU-RAY SPECIAL EDITION FEATURESNew 2K digital restoration undertaken by the Royal Belgian Film Archive, supervised by director of photography Babette Mangolte, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack Autour de “Jeanne Dielman,” a 69-minute documentary—shot by actor Sami Frey and edited by Agnes Ravez and director Chantal Akerman—made during the filming of Jeanne DielmanInterviews from 2009 with Akerman and MangolteExcerpt from “Chantal Akerman par Chantal Akerman,” a 1997 episode of the French television program Cinéma de notre tempsInterview from 2007 with Akerman’s mother, NataliaExcerpt from a 1976 television interview featuring Akerman and actor Delphine SeyrigSaute ma ville (1968), Akerman’s first film, with an introduction by the directorPLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by film scholar Ivone Margulies
