503 Lola Montès

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Matt
Joined: Tue Nov 02, 2004 12:58 pm

503 Lola Montès

#1 Post by Matt » Tue Jun 28, 2005 3:52 pm

Lola Montès

[img]http://criterion_production.s3.amazonaws.com/release_images/2551/503_box_348x490_w128.jpg[/img]

Lola Montès is a visually ravishing, narratively daring dramatization of the life of the notorious courtesan and showgirl, played by Martine Carol. With his customary cinematographic flourish and, for the first time, vibrant color, Max Ophuls charts Montès’s scandalous past through the bombastic ringmaster (Peter Ustinov) of the American circus where she ends up performing. Ophuls’s final film, Lola Montès is at once a magnificent romantic melodrama, a meditation on the lurid fascination with celebrity, and a meticulous, one-of-a-kind movie spectacle.

DISC FEATURES

- New, restored high-definition digital transfer (with uncompressed stereo soundtrack on the Blu-ray edition)
- Audio commentary featuring Max Ophuls scholar Susan White
- “Max Ophuls ou le plaisir de tourner,” a 1965 episode of the French television program Cinéastes de notre temps, featuring interviews with many of Ophuls’s collaborators
- Max by Marcel, a new documentary by Marcel Ophuls about his father and the making of Lola Montès
- Silent footage of actress Martine Carol demonstrating the various glamorous hairstyles in Lola Montès
- Theatrical rerelease trailer from Rialto Pictures
- New and improved English subtitle translation
- PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by film critic Gary Giddins

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Arcadean
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#2 Post by Arcadean » Tue Jun 28, 2005 7:11 pm

rwaits wrote:I bought Lola Montes on a whim yesterday, having never seen it before, or any other Ophuls film previously. I was floored--what a beautiful, and moving film.
I LOVE Max Ophuls films. The camera work is among the best I have ever seen. So elegant and fluid. I love the parts in his movies where he uses the same camera shot more than once. I have seen this used in Bertolucci films like The Last Tango in Paris.

My favorite of his is Earrings of Madame de... or Madame de...

Letter From an Unknown Woman is also a masterpiece from Ophuls. Unfortunately, the availability of his films in the US is pitiful. The Fox Lorber DVD (edited 110 minutes of a 140 minute movie) of Lola Montes sucks bad but I did buy it.

His son is actually a pretty damn good director himself of LONG documentaries. I believe The Sorrow and the Pity just came out on DVD recently. I haven't checked its quality yet.

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Floyd
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#3 Post by Floyd » Wed Jun 29, 2005 12:04 am

rwaits wrote:I bought Lola Montes on a whim yesterday
I watched this film for French class some time ago and I must say it was one of the worst movie experiences of my life. I had to rub my eyes constantly to make it through it.

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tryavna
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#4 Post by tryavna » Wed Jun 29, 2005 12:50 am

davidhare wrote:Lola Montes has been undergoing a German restoration which apparently restores some of the cut footage as well as color correcting and so on. One is still waiting to hear of release dates in Europe, and then no doubt an even longer wait for its arrival in the US and finally a DVD release.
I eagerly await this release.

Like Bunuel, Ophuls is one of those indisputably great filmmakers whose representation on DVD has been pitiful -- though, of course, it's getting better for Bunuel.

unclehulot
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#5 Post by unclehulot » Wed Jun 29, 2005 12:14 pm

Apparently Marcel Ophuls really does not want the 140 minute version of Lola shown. I would say it's premature to plan on any release of this version in the near future. Scroll down this Tag Gallagher article

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Simon
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#6 Post by Simon » Wed Jun 29, 2005 12:54 pm

davidhare wrote:But it still leaves me cold (unlike almost any other Ophuls film.)
My memory of it is a bit fuzzy since a say it a long time ago, but Lola Montes really left me cold, like Flixy said. There was so much distanciation from the main character, I didn't care at all about her fate so I was pretty bored by what was going on, I was left with admiring the fluid camera movements.
Last edited by Simon on Thu Oct 30, 2008 8:10 am, edited 1 time in total.

Stefan Andersson
Joined: Thu Nov 15, 2007 1:02 am

La Signora di tutti

#7 Post by Stefan Andersson » Sun Jan 20, 2008 2:54 pm

All Ophulsians rejoice: the Italian Internet vendor Videociak has a listing for a forthcoming DVD of La Signora di tutti. Deserves a thread, right?

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rohmerin
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#8 Post by rohmerin » Sat Feb 02, 2008 8:10 am

It's confirmed that La signora di tutti is a RHV release, so the image will be beautifully restored. =D>

Stefan Andersson
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#9 Post by Stefan Andersson » Mon Mar 31, 2008 2:39 am

Video Ciak lists sottotitoli inglese (English subtitles) for LA SIGNORA DI TUTTI.

Re: unclehulot´s post about a 140 min. LOLA MONTES: apparently there was never a 140 min. version, according to Maris Müller´s excellent book (in German) on LOLA MONTES. The 140-min. rumour was caused by somebody misreading the running time and publishing the wrong info. The running time should be around 113-115 mins.

Anybody seen the Italian DVD of LOLA? (French and Italian language, Italian subs only)

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Person
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#10 Post by Person » Mon Mar 31, 2008 8:26 am

Stefan Andersson wrote:Anybody seen the Italian DVD of LOLA?
Review here

Looks pretty poor, to me.

Nothing
Joined: Fri Oct 20, 2006 4:04 am

Lola Montes (Ophuls, 1955)

#11 Post by Nothing » Sat Apr 19, 2008 7:17 am

Marcel Ophuls is presenting his version of Lola Montes as Cannes this year (presumably French language only). Whoops... At least we'll now see how this compares to the wonderful German Film Museum restoration, although the home video prospects of the latter would now appear to be slim at best.

Anyone have any more information?

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tojoed
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#12 Post by tojoed » Thu May 29, 2008 4:34 am

For those who haven't seen the Second Sight thread, coming on 4/8/2008 Caught and La Ronde. Happy days.

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tojoed
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#13 Post by tojoed » Tue Jun 10, 2008 7:18 am

Special features for Caught -SPECIAL FEATURES
• Commentary by Lutz Bacher,
author of ‘Max Ophuls in the Hollywood Studios’
• ‘UNCAUGHT’ by film historian Tag Gallagher
• PHOTO GALLERY

For La Ronde SPECIAL FEATURES
• ‘Circles of Desire’ Alan Williams
on Max Ophuls’ La Ronde
• Commentary by Susan White, author of
‘The Cinema of Max Ophuls’
• Photo gallery

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otis
Joined: Mon Aug 08, 2005 11:43 am

#14 Post by otis » Sun Jul 06, 2008 2:58 pm

I can confirm that the RHV La Signora di tutti does have English subs, and the image looks great. Can't post caps at the moment, but I'll try to get round to it eventually.

Perkins Cobb
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#15 Post by Perkins Cobb » Mon Jul 07, 2008 1:08 pm

Lola Montes (certainly the new restoration, I would think) is coming to New York for a three-week run in October, although the Film Forum doesn't have any distributor listed on its website yet.

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Knappen
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#16 Post by Knappen » Mon Jul 07, 2008 3:47 pm

Cam anyone say a couple of words on the German Lachende Erben disc that seems to have been out for years?

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Tommaso
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#17 Post by Tommaso » Tue Jul 08, 2008 4:57 am

It's an ok transfer of a badly battered print. And it's a very, very minor film which has little of Ophuls' later mastery. Nominally it's a comedy, but curiously I didn't find it very funny; that may have to do with the fact that the main character is played by Heinz Rühmann, who was/is very popular in Germany, but I simply never liked his style very much (though he's actually quite good in films like "Die drei von der Tankstelle" or "Ich und die Kaiserin", but in these he's more of an ensemble player). If you can get the disc very cheap somewhere or plan to happen to order anything else from Germany, no need to avoid "Erben"; but just don't expect anything too great from it.

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Knappen
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#18 Post by Knappen » Tue Jul 08, 2008 7:52 am

Thanks.

BTW there are rumours of a boot of Die Verkaufte Braut/The Bartered Bride circulating on Ebay.

EDIT: Probably just confusion with the vhs.

David Ehrenstein
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Lola Montes: New Restored Edition

#19 Post by David Ehrenstein » Tue Jul 08, 2008 6:50 pm

Lola Montes: New Restored Edition

This just in from Carsten Carnecki at Dennis Cooper's blog:
Just back from "Lola Montez". Here's a little report for David Ehrenstein and anyone else interested.

Stefan Droessler gave us a long introduction, detailing the genesis of the three versions of the film. The first one, Max Ophuls' finalized and approved cut (although his son Marcel thinks otherwise) was immediately re-edited after the premiere into the second version, which is the one that most people are familiar with. That second version (which is available on a poor DVD in the US and was released by Criterion on Laserdisc) had some cuts here and there (Liszt and the ship sequence) as well as a shortened tracking shot in the final scene. It was also dubbed (almost) completely into French, thereby ruining Max Ophuls' preferred and intended multi-linguistic quality. The third version, a laughable 80 minute mess called "The Sins of Lola Montes", was shown on rare double features with B-Movies across the States in few theatres.

This restoration undertaken by the Munich Filmmuseum tried to reconstruct the original first cut, Ophuls' preferred and original one. In my opinion they did a stellar job. We get a few more scenes with Liszt in the carriage as well as more footage on the ship. Also back in the film is the crucial multi-language soundtrack, in which every character speaks his native language. So yes, Anton Walbrook (billed as Adolph Wohlbruck in the opening credits) speaks German, with a few words of French here and there, and Ustinov does as well. It is important to note though that this isn't a German version of the film, it's really multi-language. Characters switch from French to German and English depending on whomever they talk to and it creates a densely multi-layered soundtrack which bears resemblance to the work of Renoir, Altman and Hawks. And then there's the final tracking shot, which in this version can be seen in its full version, without any cuts.

The most important improvement, in my opinion, is the restoration of Ophuls' elaborate color scheme. Today's print was sparkling in its sharpness and vividness, yet it was particularly striking to see what Ophuls created with the flashbacks. It was his intention that each flashback would have the coloration of a particular season. The season for the Liszt flashback was autumn, which is why there are beautiful dark yellow, burgundy and brown tones. The Bavaria flashback with Walbrook has more white and light blue. The restored version really lets us see what remarkable things Ophuls achieved with Technicolor. This important aspect is totally absent from the US DVD, due to its washed out image quality. On an interesting side note, Droessler said that Ophuls even had a whole outdoor road (the one to the house where Liszt and Lola sleep over night) painted yellow. One can only appreciate that in a 35mm print of this restoration.

So it's obviously a great film historical achievement, even though the male Beatrice Welles of the film world, Marcel Ophuls, doesn't want to accept the Filmmuseum's restoration and offered his own, which was shown at Cannes this year. Droessler said that Marcel's restoration follows the very same constructional scheme that their version laid out, but Marcel simply used other takes and kept it all French. Quite ludicrous if you ask me, but it's the darn Beatrice-syndrome. Anyway, it's a great film brought to fresh light and I'm glad I caught this special screening.

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Cinephrenic
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#20 Post by Cinephrenic » Tue Jul 08, 2008 7:03 pm

My guts tell me this is coming from Criterion.

David Ehrenstein
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#21 Post by David Ehrenstein » Tue Jul 08, 2008 7:14 pm

I hope your guts are right.

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cgray
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#22 Post by cgray » Tue Jul 08, 2008 7:16 pm

If true (that Lola will soon be meeting JM), I would bet this is why the first three were not packaged together as a box (thus avoiding the inevitable fan question, "Why an Ophuls box, then release Lola Montes outside of it?!").

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Ivy Mike
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#23 Post by Ivy Mike » Tue Jul 08, 2008 7:16 pm

Hmm, I didn't realize there were two restorations going on simultaneously. So is there a possibility we'll see both of these in the home video market - possibly from two different distributors?

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justeleblanc
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#24 Post by justeleblanc » Tue Jul 08, 2008 8:16 pm

cgray wrote:If true (that Lola will soon be meeting JM), I would bet this is why the first three were not packaged together as a box (thus avoiding the inevitable fan question, "Why an Ophuls box, then release Lola Montes outside of it?!").
I remember this coming up before. It seems to me that box sets are really only saved for films in a series or thematically linked and I'm not sure that argument can be made of these Ophuls films if there are others that would meet the criteria for the box as well. Though the one exception was the Cassavetes box, which could have easily included Love Streams, Husbands, or M & M.

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jsteffe
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#25 Post by jsteffe » Wed Jul 09, 2008 11:34 am

davidhare wrote:I got the impression Marcel Ophuls had obtained legal restraints to effectively supress the German language restoration. In any case the duration and film itself are identical for both versions, bar the audio track.
A friend of mind showed me a copy of the ARTE(?) broadcast of the German-language version, and the closing shot is different. It's a longer, and much more effective tracking shot out from Lola Montes. What a pity it's not in the French-language version. I wonder if there are differences elsewhere in the film.

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