The Silver Screen column discussion

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Pirate King

somewhere out there is Lawrence of Arabia which has been rumored to have a 2012 release date....

No rumor. The Blu-ray for Lawrence of Arabia does have a 2012 release date and will street this year, that’s a fact…

as is, for instance, this –http://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread....8k#post5673213 as well as other recent posts I’ve made about that title….http://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread....ir#post5896569

The only recent ‘rumor’ that I’m aware of was the misinformation originally posted on a Norwegian website claiming a final release date of June 13, 2012 in that country, which I’ve been subsequently informed, was further promoted on other various U.S. websites including the Digital Bits and HTF.

That misinformation leading to that rumor was quickly shot down….http://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread....an#post5943583

And subsequently rectified by the reporting independent website in Norway.

[Pirate King]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

No rumor. The Blu-ray for Lawrence of Arabia does have a 2012 release date and will street this year, that’s a fact…

as is, for instance, this –http://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread....8k#post5673213 as well as other recent posts I’ve made about that title….http://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread....ir#post5896569

The only recent ‘rumor’ that I’m aware of was the misinformation originally posted on a Norwegian website claiming a final release date of June 13, 2012 in that country, which I’ve been subsequently informed, was further promoted on other various U.S. websites including the Digital Bits and HTF.

That misinformation leading to that rumor was quickly shot down….http://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread....an#post5943583

And subsequently rectified by the reporting independent website in Norway.

This is very good news. I kinda knew LOA was coming this year.. It is my most anticipated Blu-ray. Thanks for all your insight and knowledge.

[Robert Siegel]

For disaster and classic fans, I have just posted my largest column yeton the film, there was just too much information and I didn't want to cut anything out.

Thanks for all your kind remarks on the columns.

Paulo Elias: I agree with you. The studios should be providing quality transfers of all of these movies and take pride in their libraries. And subtitles should be a no-brainer!

Penton-man: What great news to hear about Lawrence of Arabia, though I have kept up with your thread for a long long time. I am sure this will be an event release, and it surely will be covered in The Silver Screen. I have many rare materials on this film and have already contacted several collectors and film libraries. I hope that Sony sees fit to release the Academy Award winning (Best Picture) Oliver! and Funny Girl (also Academy Award Winning for Streisand). I am eagerly awaiting those two as well.

Pirate King: I agree with you, 2012 is turning out to be a great year in classics. Had I started writing The Silver Screen when the Blu-ray format first appeared, there wouldn't have been much to write about. Now I finish one column and have to choose from a number of films which new release to do next. That's major progress. And seeing all of these classic in high definition with my projector and 159" screen that I was never able to see in the big city theaters (I was born in 1962 in a small town in northern Minnesota) has been a dream come true.

I also have to give a hats off to Olive Films and Twilight Time for taking classics seriously enough to offer back catalog that would otherwise not be available!

Enjoy The Poseidon Adventure column.

http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=8479

[Robert Siegel]

[Blu Titan]

Robert, fantastic job on the The Poseidon Adventure column...really enjoyed it .

[Pirate King]

Thank you Robert for the newest.. I will call it.. Mega article. It will sure make my viewing of the Poseidon Adventure more entertaining. It also appears that we have many more treats in store for us in the future. Thanks again.

[Robert Siegel]

As most of you know, we unfortunately had a crash of the hard drive (server) here at the site. As for The Silver Screen column, 5 of the Silver Screen columns were lost. But if you are looking to reference them I will have them back up in a very short time. Those include Camelot, Men in Black 1 & 2, Gremlins 1 & 2, Casablanca and The Green Berets. Thanks to Deciazulado, our site manager, who has recovered the new "Yellow Submarine" column which is now in the top news on the front page (and a big heads-up and hug to him for that). These lost columns will be re-posted if they cannot be recovered.

I must say that in my communication with management of the site during this unfortunate event, everyone here on the team, who are wonderful people, are working around the clock to restore what can be restored. I am very proud to be among the staff here at Blu-ray.com!

[ZoetMB]

You wrote:

Yellow Submarine is replete with famous Beatle hits both old and new played and sung by the Beatles. The Beatles were a pretty serious lot. They knew they had contributed something genuine to modern life, and they were proud of it. John Lennon, the unofficial leader of the group, was still the farthest out, the most rebellious and unconventional. His dabblings with oriental music earned him a new reputation as a serious musician. Ringo Starr was the poker-faced Harpo Marx of the quartette. But he had demonstrated an ability for hard work which surprised everybody. George Harrison was still the anchor man of the foursome and Paul McCartney wrote most of their music.

This is what you get when you copy someone else's writing without atribution and without researching whether it's correct. This is completely wrong. Lennon didn't dabble in "oriental" music (he did however, dabble in "oriental" women, or one woman, Yoko Ono), it was Harrison (the Brits always called people from India, "orientals"). McCartney didn't write most of their music, Lennon AND McCartney did. And as great as George was, no one would have defined George as the "anchor" of the group. Whoever wrote this originally got all their Beatles mixed up. It was probably written by some 70-year-old (back then) hack press agent who hated rock music.

At the time of restoration, the producers of the DVD were granted permission to remix the music (songs) and went back to the Beatle's original four-track work tapes and put together true multi-track masters for all fifteen songs. There was some controversy over this, but it is said the surviving Beatles were very pleased with the results. A 5.1 track was developed for that mix

While I do remember that mix sounding pretty good (I heard it used as a demo at the Audio Engineering Society convention), I would hope that's not the mix that was used for this BD because that Yellow Sub DVD remix was done before the Beatles catalog was completely remastered. I was under the assumption (although I have no facts to back it up) that the multichannel remixes used for the Cirque du Soleil "Love" show in Las Vegas would have been used for the new Yellow Submarine BD.
---
Only four songs in Yellow Submarine were new and they were all previously rejects: "It's All Too Much" and "All Together Now" were recorded in June of 1967 around the same time as "All You Need is Love". "Only A Northern Song" (written by Harrison and which was about the extremely poor rate the Beatles were getting from their music publisher) and "Hey Bulldog" were recorded in February of '68 around the same time they recorded "Lady Madonna".

[Paulo Elias]

Robert,

I must hand it to you, the patience, the labour, and the effort to produce some of the best articles on movie making that I have ever read.

Coincidentally, I got my Blu-Ray disc from Amazon-US and I was watching it yesterday. The disc replaces the former letterbox DVD edition made a long time ago.

For the collector, the advance in quality is incredible, jumping from a flawed 4:3 picture into what seems an artefact free medium to appreciate this film.

Most people of my generation followed the success of The Beatles back in the 1960's, until Yoko Ono jumped on board and screwed up their relationship, but I must confess I am definitely not a die-hard fan.

Material from this era is important, from a collector's point of view, regardless of biological age. But when it comes to the films they made, some controversy may arise, in this case the almost primitive drawings and lame cartoon techniques used for the Yellow Submarine project. Looking at how revealing and detailed the Blu-Ray screen looks I find more reasons to believe that the film makers either did not care about cartoon quality or made that way on purpose.

I sincerely hope that I am in the minority group of those who still think that this movie is not that great, for fan's sake. Some of the dialogue lines in Yellow Submarine are appalling. The script looks to me as they dragged a dull story over 1:30 running time, in order to showcase the music from the Beatles. And those segments, by the way, are actually the best moments of the whole picture, which is just too little for any ulterior ambition the film makers might have had when they were shooting it.

Ironically, this Blu-Ray edition does not make the film better, but it does show off the restoration efforts for both sound and picture from the surviving elements, and these are, in their own right, good reasons to buy it and keep it.

[IronWaffle]

You indicate the voice acting is by the band, but it is not. They are active participants only in the closing live action bit. Voice actors did the rest.

[Robert Siegel]

Originally Posted by ZoetMB

You wrote:


Lennon didn't dabble in "oriental" music (he did however, dabble in "oriental" women, or one woman, Yoko Ono), it was Harrison (the Brits always called people from India, "orientals").

The material I used, first of all, was not copied, please stop insinuating that I just copy and paste stories. This is a direct insult to the days I spend on each article. This came from the original press materials for the Yellow Submarine film itself! In researching this further, I find you correct and have corrected the error. Perhaps it would be more kind to simply state that there is an error in the column than always begin with an (incorrect) insult. There is always a way to private message me, but obviously it is important to you that everyone sees not your corrections, but insults. There are times when not every single word can be researched or there would be one every two months.

Thank you for the correction.

[Robert Siegel]

Originally Posted by IronWaffle

You indicate the voice acting is by the band, but it is not. They are active participants only in the closing live action bit. Voice actors did the rest.

Absolutely correct, thank you Ironwaffle.

[Robert Siegel]

Originally Posted by Paulo Elias

Robert,

I must hand it to you, the patience, the labour, and the effort to produce some of the best articles on movie making that I have ever read.

Coincidentally, I got my Blu-Ray disc from Amazon-US and I was watching it yesterday. The disc replaces the former letterbox DVD edition made a long time ago.

For the collector, the advance in quality is incredible, jumping from a flawed 4:3 picture into what seems an artefact free medium to appreciate this film.

Most people of my generation followed the success of The Beatles back in the 1960's, until Yoko Ono jumped on board and screwed up their relationship, but I must confess I am definitely not a die-hard fan.

Material from this era is important, from a collector's point of view, regardless of biological age. But when it comes to the films they made, some controversy may arise, in this case the almost primitive drawings and lame cartoon techniques used for the Yellow Submarine project. Looking at how revealing and detailed the Blu-Ray screen looks I find more reasons to believe that the film makers either did not care about cartoon quality or made that way on purpose.

I sincerely hope that I am in the minority group of those who still think that this movie is not that great, for fan's sake. Some of the dialogue lines in Yellow Submarine are appalling. The script looks to me as they dragged a dull story over 1:30 running time, in order to showcase the music from the Beatles. And those segments, by the way, are actually the best moments of the whole picture, which is just too little for any ulterior ambition the film makers might have had when they were shooting it.

Ironically, this Blu-Ray edition does not make the film better, but it does show off the restoration efforts for both sound and picture from the surviving elements, and these are, in their own right, good reasons to buy it and keep it.

Thanks for the kind comments Paulo. I have not yet watched the remaster, hopefully I will get some time to do that in the next few weeks.

[Valaquenta]

You say in your article about Gold Rush that production commenced on February 7, 1924 and concluded on the 15th of April (I'm assuming 1924), and that the film had it's Los Angeles premiere on June 26, 1925. This gave Chaplin two months to completely edit, score and finish the picture after shooting was finished.

I find the math interesting, but somehow I can't work it out as I believe it should be 14 months to editing the movie etc. making it somewhat more normal. I believe only Clint Eastwood can do it faster

As always keep your articles coming as they are just brilliant

[BHolst]

Another outstanding article, Robert! Makes me look forward to the next B&N %50 off Criterions even more

One thing though, the second poster that is listed as being Swedish is actually Danish (possibly Norwegian).

Keep up the good work, always interesting to get in-depth information on old classics (and, sometimes for me, lesser known movies).

[Robert Siegel]

New column is up, Disney's Treasure Planet. How amazing it was to delve into the history of this film, as I always considered it to be a fantastic achievement in animation, in other words, I love the film. But I suggest you take a look at the column and read about all of the work that went into this film, it's amazing!

http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=9039

[ALLIED_GOONIE]

The artwork you've labelled "DVD Poster" is in fact not a DVD Poster as it have Disney Interactive and ESRB logos on it. It's a video game cover/poster.

[christsui]

Thanks for the great, comprehensive Treasure Planet article! However, I'd like to point out that the "Japanese poster" in the article is in fact the *Hong Kong* theatrical poster (I'm from HK so I know), hope you can change that!

[Robert Siegel]

Thanks to Allied_Goonie and christsui, I'll make those changes. With such an extensive article, one tries to be 100% correct but there's just so many components.......hope you enjoyed it.

Are you buying the disc? Mine is coming today and tonight will be Treasure Planet in my home theater. I personally didn't think this would be released for a long time, but sometimes titles have been popping out that just weren't expected, many times for the positive, like this one!

[Mahatma]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

No rumor. The Blu-ray for Lawrence of Arabia does have a 2012 release date and will street this year, that’s a fact…

as is, for instance, this –http://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread....8k#post5673213 as well as other recent posts I’ve made about that title….http://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread....ir#post5896569

The only recent ‘rumor’ that I’m aware of was the misinformation originally posted on a Norwegian website claiming a final release date of June 13, 2012 in that country, which I’ve been subsequently informed, was further promoted on other various U.S. websites including the Digital Bits and HTF.

That misinformation leading to that rumor was quickly shot down….http://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread....an#post5943583

And subsequently rectified by the reporting independent website in Norway.

You know what,either sony have gone NSA-style clampdown on rumours,or I have a sneaky suspicion that it won't surface this year...Why the secrecy?