We went from Demon of Mount Oe to another foreign obscurity, 1950’s Heart of Stone, made by the East German film company DEFA. In other words, it was supervised by the Communist Party, and thus is unsurprisingly not very favorable to Capitalism. On the other hand, they don’t ram it down your throats, so that’s nice. It’s basically a combo of Darby O’Gill and the Little People and All That Money Can Buy. The protagonist is super unlikeable (the film’s biggest flaw), always looking for shortcuts, even dangerous supernatural ones. He even has a friendly magic leprechaun on his side. But when he messes up the wishes granted by the former, he turns to the overtly menacing Dutch Michael, a one-eyed giant. The production values are amazing; it’s nice to have the State’s coffers behind you. A very neat film, but warning, you need an all-region player to play the blu ray. (The Blu Ray presentation is terrific, not represented by the blurry image above.)
