So, I guess no new Blu of FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH?
I could go for that and Sixteen Candles. Fast Times while I understand that there is so little you can do with the existing source, but man is the current Blu I have horrible looking and really lacks in extras.
Starring Catherine Deneuve, Michel Piccoli, and Jean Sorel
New 4K Restoration
Quote:
(1967) “Pierre, please don’t let the cats out,” plaintively requests almost-dainty Catherine Deneuve to her handsome doctor husband Jean Sorel, who interrupts their country idyll to order their coachmen to strip, whip, and assault her among the trees — “The coach again?,” p.j.-clad Sorel resignedly replies as they prepare for sleep in twin beds. And, during a chance encounter at the tennis club, though constantly insinuating family friend Michel Piccoli insists “I’m harmless,” he mentions his favorite “house,” helpfully adding its address at 11, Cité Jean de Saumur. And so with the aid of Geneviève Page’s Madame Anaïs, Deneuve becomes “Belle de Jour.” Possessiveness, actual marital devotion, that constant buttinsky Piccoli, street violence, etc., precipitate an ending totally surreal… and yet totally logical. Screenplay by Buñuel and Jean-Claude Carrière, from the novel by Joseph Kessel, author of Army of Shadows. 4K DCP restoration. Approx. 100 min.
Restored in 4K from the original negative by Studiocanal, in partnership with the CNC, La Cinémathèque Française, the Franco-American Cultural Fund and the house of Yves Saint Laurent. Presented with support from the George Fasel Memorial Fund for Classic French Cinema.
(1954) In 18th century Kyoto, scrollmaker’s wife Kyōko Kagawa (Tokyo Story, Red Beard) and his top assistant Kazuo Hasegawa (Gate of Hell, An Actor’s Revenge) are driven together by the master’s meanness and jealousy, then confess their hidden love — but what happens now? Adapted from a bunraku play by Chikamatsu, the “Shakespeare of the puppet theater,” and boasting some of Mizoguchi’s most atmospheric staging, this is “Romeo and Juliet to Sansho the Bailiff’s King Lear” (David Shipman) — with the confession scene aboard a skiff adrift in the mist a highlight. Photographed by the great Kazuo Miyagawa (Rashomon, Yojimbo, etc.). 4K DCP restoration. Approx. 93 min.
Restored by Kadokawa Corporation and The Film Foundation at Cineric, Inc. in New York, sound by Audio Mechanics, with the cooperation of The Japan Foundation. Special thanks to Masahiro Miyajima and Martin Scorsese for their consultation.
(1954) During Japan’s Heian Period, the family of a disgraced aristocrat is attacked by pirates, with wife Kinuyo Tanaka (Ugetsu, Life of Oharu, etc.) sold into prostitution and her two children enslaved. But thanks to one grown-up sibling’s sacrifice, the other escapes, and then... Mizoguchi’s adaptation of a famous legend is one of his most atmospheric works and third Venice Silver Lion winner. 4K DCP restoration. Approx. 114 min.
Restored by Kadokawa Corporation and The Film Foundation at Cineric, Inc. in New York, sound by Audio Mechanics, with the cooperation of The Japan Foundation. Special thanks to Masahiro Miyajima and Martin Scorsese for their consultation.
(1947) Saucy go-getter Suzy Delair’s Jenny Lamour (“a voluptuous slut” – Pauline Kael) warms up an entertainment-starved Paris music hall audience with a swing of her ineffably euphemistic “tra-la-la,” part of the arsenal of charms she uses in her breakthrough to the big time. It also means suggestive publicity photos taken by sympathetic lesbian photographer Simone Renant, and a nocturnal meeting with a sleazy movie nancier. But then congenitally jealous accompanist husband Bernard Blier issues an all-too-public death threat against the dirty old fogey. So when the nancier winds up très mort, Blier becomes the prime suspect at Quai des Orfèvres, France’s Scotland Yard equivalent. Enter Inspector Louis Jouvet (“the greatest theater man of his generation and one of the half-dozen great screen actors” – David Shipman), who begins to take apart Blier’s meticulous alibi... Brilliantly transforming a classic whodunnit plot, Clouzot, “the French Hitchcock,” takes us from the wings and dressing rooms of the Parisian music hall to the drab, airless corridors and holding cells of the Quai’s Criminal Investigations Department, in a blend of social realism and psychological cruelty that became his trademark. One of the unrecognized masterpieces of the post-war French cinema, a Noir tour de force that won Clouzot the coveted Best Director prize at Venice. 4K DCP restoration.
Presented with support from The George Fasel Memorial Fund for Classic French Cinema.
(1943) Fish-out-of-watered in a provincial town, coolly suave Parisian doctor Pierre Fresnay (Grand Illusion, Marius in Pagnol’s Marseilles trilogy) finds himself the target of poison pen letters from “Le Corbeau” (the “Raven” or “Crow”) — but then, slowly but surely, so does everyone else, even as an unknowingly terminal patient gets the bad news, the postmaster confiscates one addressed to his own wife, and letters literally float out of the air in public places. Hysteria and finger-pointing rule, with a suspect’s panicky flight through deserted cobble-stoned streets to the tune of an off-screen lynch mob an unnerving highlight. Made by a German production company during the — never mentioned — Occupation, though from a pre-war original script, Corbeau got Clouzot banned from the French film industry for two years post-Liberation. 4K DCP restoration. Approx. 114 min.
Restored in 4K by Studiocanal, with the support of the CNC.
Presented with support from The George Fasel Memorial Fund for Classic French Cinema.
There's three I've been wanting to watch for a long time which I never have: Belle de Jour, A Story from Chikamatsu, and Sansho. Hopefully, that means will see Blu releases of them all this year. There also isn't enough Mizoguchi on Blu.
Can someone please confirm if Bigger Than Life contains English or English SDH subtitles, please?
English SDH.
English SDH for English language films and English subtitles for non-English language films. That's their usual policy (with a few exceptions like The American Friend, which is English-German language film and contains both English and English SDH subtitles).
The version of Belle du jour we have presently is gorgeous. Or am I missing something?
According to the review, the current version is a 2K scan from an interpositive, as opposed to 4K from the negative. I haven't watched my disc in quite some time, but I remember it looking outstanding. From the pictures in the review, it's hard for me to imagine it looking any better either.
The version of Belle du jour we have presently is gorgeous. Or am I missing something?
There is a new Studio Canal 4K restoration for the film. Recent UK, Germany, France Blu-rays used that restoration. I presume StarDestroyer52 wants that.
According to the review, the current version is a 2K scan from an interpositive, as opposed to 4K from the negative. I haven't watched my disc in quite some time, but I remember it looking outstanding. From the pictures in the review, it's hard for me to imagine it looking any better either.
To be honest, when it comes right down to it I don't think that I have the same ability to notice these things as some other people. Maybe it's because I'm older and my vision isn't as good as it once was; maybe it's just that my home theater set-up just isn't top notch; maybe it's some combination of those things. I don't know.
But I see people talk about some improvement here or there, and I just don't see it myself.
To be honest, when it comes right down to it I don't think that I have the same ability to notice these things as some other people. Maybe it's because I'm older and my vision isn't as good as it once was; maybe it's just that my home theater set-up just isn't top notch; maybe it's some combination of those things. I don't know.
But I see people talk about some improvement here or there, and I just don't see it myself.
I don't have a home theater set-up myself, so I can't comment on the audio at all. As to the picture - at the time, I had only watched it on a 32 inch set - now I have a 43 - but I loved the look of it. I'm very pleased myself. If it can be improved upon though, I will certainly buy it again.
There is a new Studio Canal 4K restoration for the film. Recent UK, Germany, France Blu-rays used that restoration. I presume StarDestroyer52 wants that.
That's what I meant since I saw an entry for Remastered. I didn't know they messed up the restoration(it's all very difficult to keep up with sometimes). It's helpful to know that the current Blu is the best option to get. I will have to pick it up during the next sale.
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