The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (1966) (Remastered)

[WaverBoy]

According to Glenn Erickson (DVD Savant), a couple of his trusted sources have informed him that the newly-released standalone Blu-ray of THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY has been blessed with the original monaural soundtrack. Can anyone here confirm this?

Here's what he says, including a bit about who's not responsible for the new color timing:

As some of you know, back at MGM in 1997 I ended up being in a position to propose that an English-language version be produced of the long Italian cut of The Good, The Bad and The Ugly. That finally happened about five years later, after I left the company. Last week I got a look at the new 4K transfer of GBU on the June release Blu-ray set called The Man With No Name Trilogy. I won't be reviewing it. But I have some news to report about it that Leone fans might want to hear.

First, some people are blaming disc distributors Fox and MGM for the disc's inexplicable color choices -- it's so yellow that the daytime scenes look like they have been gone over with a yellow highlighter. To be really unkind, maybe it should be called the 'Andres Serrano Edition' of GBU. Please somebody spread the word to the flamers out there that want to storm MGM with an angry mob, and tell them that the restoration, transfer and color choices on the new 4K transfer were all decided by restoration experts in Italy. My old MGM compatriot John Kirk had nothing to do with these new versions, and it's not fun reading denunciations of him in posts from people that don't know better. John has done too much good for film curatorship to deserve this.

The good news is about the audio for GBU. We know that the stereo remix from 2003 introduced a variety of non-doctrinaire revisions -- 'improved' new sound effects, cut 'n' paste music tracks, etc.. At this writing, Sergio Leone fans are also not happy with the audio options for GBU on The Man With No Name Trilogy Blu-ray set, which they quickly discovered still does not include an original monaural audio track, only a mono mixdown of the disputed 5.1 remix, the one with the replacement sound effects. Making things more confusing, the new restoration credits for the 4K remaster specifically list a mono audio restoration by Chace (now called Chace Audio by Deluxe).

When the single disc edition of GBU appeared in October we assumed it would be identical to the disc in the Trilogy box set. NOPE -- two trustworthy and knowledgeable Savant readers have written in to report that a restored original mono choice has been added. The single-disc release is the first time that the original monaural has been available since the 1998 DVD of the short U.S. theatrical version. Fans of the original mix can finally enjoy all those original wheezy Leone gunshot sound effects again.