Eva was originally intended as a three hour drama but Losey was forced to cut it down to a two and a half hour running time by his producers. In that form, the film enjoyed several acclaimed press screenings but censorship fears resulted in further editing on Eva and by the time it was released theatrically, it ran a mere 103 minutes. Needless to say, Losey was terribly disappointed with the final cut (he disowned it) and moved on to The Servant (1963) which was a unanimous success with critics and the film that elevated his status as a director.
Thanks to Kino International, we can finally see an alternate director's cut of Eva (titled Eve in the credits) and the original release version of the film on the same DVD! The director's cut runs 119 minutes and, though shorter than Losey's 140 minute cut, is much closer to his original conception. This version was taken from the only surviving print of a Swedish/Finnish release print that was housed in the British Film Institute. Although the visual quality is often on a par with VHS public domain titles and there are two sets of Scandinavian subtitles, Eve still affords Losey fans the opportunity to view several previously unseen sequences that flesh out Eva and Tyvian's self-destructive relationship. Much more pleasing to the eye is the shorter theatrical release version of Eva which perfectly captures the decadent romantic allure of Venice in silvery, black and white tones. The music score by Michel Legrand is equally striking.
Both Eva and Eve are presented in the 1:85:1 letterboxed format though, as noted, Eve comes with a dual set of on-screen subtitles which are not optional. Otherwise, the disk has no extra features other than an attractive snapcase and the liner notes by Bret Wood.
For more information on Eva>, visit Kino International. To purchase a copy of Eva, visit Movies Unlimited.
By Jeff Stafford
