Bridge on the River Kwai & Lawrence of Arabia

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kekid
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#26 Post by kekid » Sat Mar 08, 2008 2:15 pm

Should we include Dr. Zhivago discussion in this thread or start a different thread for it?

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tryavna
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#27 Post by tryavna » Sat Mar 08, 2008 5:14 pm

Stefan Andersson wrote:Hi tryavna! Thanks for reading my info, I want to keep discussion of LOA alive and kicking. No offense taken!
No offense taken or intended. I just wanted to make sure that you knew at whom my (very minor) criticism was directed.
kekid wrote:Should we include Dr. Zhivago discussion in this thread or start a different thread for it?
Discussion of Zhivago probably should be kept separate, since this thread was set up mainly to discuss future releases of titles that Sony owns. Isn't there a thread for Dr. Z. somewhere in the Warners subforum?

atcolomb
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#28 Post by atcolomb » Tue Apr 01, 2008 2:46 pm

Does anybody have more info on the April 15 release of Bridge On The River Kwai 2 disc Special Edition? I have the 2 disc box set released some years ago and i wonder if this is a rehash of it.

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kinjitsu
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#29 Post by kinjitsu » Tue Apr 01, 2008 5:14 pm

Disappointingly, Bridge on the River Kwai is yet another repackaging, and as far as I can tell, so is Lawrence of Arabia, so hold on to your Superbit.

atcolomb
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#30 Post by atcolomb » Wed Apr 02, 2008 8:28 am

That's too bad....the print used on the previous dvd releases on Bridge is ok and could be much better but i did read somewhere that the original negatives were in bad shape!! I hate seeing repackages....it's like electing George Bush for president over and over again!! #-o

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Petty Bourgeoisie
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#31 Post by Petty Bourgeoisie » Sat Apr 12, 2008 3:33 am

I'm having trouble wrapping my head around Sony simply reissuing Lawrence of Arabia with it's 2001 LE transfer. Maybe I'm giving them too much credit, but that seems senseless (even for a major studio). My doubt is supported by the fact that this was supposed to come out over a year ago and was postponed 13 months (for an unknown reason).

I need to add Lawrence of Arabia to my collection so I was just about to order a used Superbit. However, I'm gonna wait until next week to read reviews of the new edition. The Amazon product description says "Newly restored - pristine audio & picture quality" so I have my fingers crossed.

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swo17
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#32 Post by swo17 » Fri Apr 18, 2008 1:45 pm

Has anyone seen any reviews yet of the new LoA Collectors' Edition? I'm still holding out hope that, by some chance, a new scan was made for an upcoming BD release, and that this new SD release was derived from it. Otherwise, I don't know how these movie industry guys could sleep at night--simply repackaging the old even as you are working on the new.

atcolomb
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#33 Post by atcolomb » Fri Apr 18, 2008 2:32 pm

I know some people don't like A Passage To India but i can't wait to see it on Blue Ray and so far the reviews on the transfer have been very postive even if the reviews of the film itself are not. I think it's a great film!!

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Petty Bourgeoisie
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#34 Post by Petty Bourgeoisie » Fri Apr 18, 2008 5:11 pm

swo17 wrote:Has anyone seen any reviews yet of the new LoA Collectors' Edition?
Nope, no reviews from the major sites. Some guy on the imdb message board who bought it says it is the superbit transfer married to the special features from the 2001 Limited Edition. If that's true I'll order it soon as the superbit transfer is supposedly top-notch.

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denti alligator
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#35 Post by denti alligator » Fri Apr 18, 2008 5:26 pm

But the Blu-ray versions of these are still coming, right? And those will have required a completely new mastering, right?

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Luke M
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#36 Post by Luke M » Fri Apr 18, 2008 7:21 pm

denti alligator wrote:But the Blu-ray versions of these are still coming, right? And those will have required a completely new mastering, right?
Yes. Even on one of my Sony discs there's a preview for upcoming Blu-rays including LoA. I don't know what's taking so long but the recent Blu release of Passage to India is encouraging. Dr. Zhivago is Warner so that may be different.

videozor
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#37 Post by videozor » Tue Apr 29, 2008 3:51 pm

kinjitsu wrote:Disappointingly, Bridge on the River Kwai is yet another repackaging, and as far as I can tell, so is Lawrence of Arabia
I've made very superficial comparison between old and new disks.

BRIDGE: Disk 1 looks the same as the old one, but initial Columbia logo is replaced by Sony's and then DVD skips the movie title and brings you directly to the top menu. Files on Disk 1 are dated from 2000.
Disk 2 is dated from 2008, but to me it's exactly the same as the old one, up to Columbia Classics logo and previews of such "new" issues as Guns of Navarone.

LoA: files on both disks are dated from 2008. Disk 1 starts with Sony logo, David Lean collection preview (new editions of LoA, Bridge and Passage as well as BRD of Passage). Then it presents lengthy preview of 2008 Raisin on the Sun (!?) Menu is the same. What makes one think that this is different transfer is that Disk 1 stops right after Taking of Akaba and not where the actual Part 1 ends. So Disk 2 starts from Lawrence entering Officer's Bar, goes thru Entr'acte and then Part 2 of the movie. To me movie itself looks a bit darker, but basically the same. I didn't try to compare framing, aspect ratio, etc.

I leave for other members to make a more detailed comparison, but for me decision is clear - I'm keeping old diks...

atcolomb
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#38 Post by atcolomb » Tue Apr 29, 2008 3:58 pm

videozor wrote:Disk 1 looks the same as the old one, but initial Columbia logo is replaced by Sony's and then DVD skips the movie title and brings you directly to the top menu. Files on Disk 1 are dated from 2000.
Videozor......Does the Sony logo replace the Columbia logo at the begining of the film or when the dvd starts up?.........

videozor
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#39 Post by videozor » Tue Apr 29, 2008 5:46 pm

When the DVD starts up...

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fiddlesticks
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Re: Bridge on the River Kwai & Lawrence of Arabia

#40 Post by fiddlesticks » Sat Apr 11, 2009 7:56 pm

TCM just played Kwai again, prompting me to ask about a line of dialog at the end that I've never understood. In case there's anyone out there who's not seen this film, I'll use spoiler tags.
SpoilerShow
After the bridge blows up and everyone else of consequence is dead, Jack Hawkins get a collective dirty look from the five bearers. He says to them, "I had to do it. They might have been captured alive!" before angrily tossing the mortar into the river. He must have been referring to William Holden and Geoffrey Horne, the only people for whom capture would be an issue, and the only people in whom the bearers would be interested. But Hawkins didn't kill either of them; both were killed by rifle fire from Japanese soldiers on the bridge. The only identifiable person he did kill is Alec Guinness, but the line makes no sense as applied to him. So what does he mean? Did the bearers not understand until that moment that their new boyfriends might be killed, albeit by the Japanese, and is he just generally apologizing as a commander for their deaths? If so, it's certainly an odd choice of words, one that suggests that he personally and intentionally killed them with his mortar--but I think it is evident that he did not. This has always confused me. Any ideas?

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Jeff
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Re: Bridge on the River Kwai & Lawrence of Arabia

#41 Post by Jeff » Sat Aug 14, 2010 5:29 pm


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Finch
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Re: Bridge on the River Kwai & Lawrence of Arabia

#42 Post by Finch » Sat Aug 14, 2010 7:09 pm

Great to see this confirmed. Since the film wasn't revisited between the old 2001 release (I believe the reissue last year or so used the old files) and this new restoration, and Dr Zhivago was so well served by Blu-Ray, Kwai should look quite stunning. All the more chuffed now that I managed to sell the DVD!

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Person
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Re: Bridge on the River Kwai & Lawrence of Arabia

#43 Post by Person » Sun Aug 15, 2010 2:32 pm

I cooked up Kwai few weeks ago. Good telecine. A few frames were funky, like. Good movie. A lesson in madness, for sure!
Sony had better keep that documentary as it's a humdinger, brother!
The show is a nice flavour of Chrétien's ingenius process. Nice wide images! Bring on a Blu of them!


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Brian C
I hate to be That Pedantic Guy but...
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Re: Bridge on the River Kwai & Lawrence of Arabia

#45 Post by Brian C » Mon Aug 23, 2010 8:32 pm

Don't have it in front of me, but I'm 99% sure that the original Sony DVD was 2.55:1

EDIT: Yup.

kaream
Joined: Tue Oct 19, 2010 1:36 pm

Lwwrence of Arabia

#46 Post by kaream » Sat Nov 20, 2010 11:31 pm

Ever since I picked up Sony's DVD of Lawrence of Arabia a year or two ago to watch it again, and was so dismayed that I had to check out all the different Sony editions I could get my hands on, I have been hoping that Criterion might stick their thumb in Sony's eye by releasing an uncut version of this film. And I still don't understand whatever prompted this cut in the first place.

Over in the discussion boards at IMDb for Lawrence of Arabia there are always questions and arguments concerning "was he or wasn't he" - raped by the Turks, that is. About a month ago I posted a response to a thread there, "what were the Turks about to do to Lawrence?", and immediately got into a long and friendly discussion with someone called "Hancock_the_Superb" about the reliability of my memory from having seen the movie many years earlier.
In the original US theatrical release which I saw when it first came out, following Lawrence's beating on the bench, the Bey looks out from his office door. The next scene shows Lawrence up in the Bey's office, being tied to what is obviously a permanent structure kept there, a sort of large wooden trestle, with his arms tied above his head, and in a position forcing him to lean slightly forward. The Bey is watching this with a look of satisfied anticipation, while Lawrence has a look of utter horror on his face. This is a very brief scene, but it leaves no question at all of an impending anal rape by the Bey.

Then the movie cuts to Lawrence being thrown out into the road, which is where the Sony DVD picks up again.

Whether or not the historical T E Lawrence was ever raped by one or more Turks, it's obvious that David Lean in his original cut of the film intended to show that the rape did in fact occur. I've always felt this was a crucial scene that gives the viewer important insight into Lawrence's subsequent psychological state. Unlike other cuts made to reduce the film's runtime, this was apparently a result of censorship.

What particularly struck me at the time, and has since stayed with me, was the expressions on the two men's faces. If there's anything about this scene that seems a little hazy to me, it's the precise appearance of what I've described as a "trestle", and exactly how Lawrence was tied to it.

I'm absolutely convinced that this scene as I've described it was in fact in the original theatrical release. My recollection is not just general, but specifically of Ferrer's face and expression, and of O'Toole's face and expression, as they looked at each other, and as O'Toole/Lawrence realized that the worst was yet to come. He was not stripped down, but was still wearing his thawb. The scene was shot so that there was nothing prurient, and youngsters might have imagined that he was simply to have been beaten further.

The scene is shot entirely inside the Bey's office. The wooden structure is not makeshift, but is obviously a permanent fixture in his office (which gives us important information about the Bey's predilections).

The office door is at the far left side of the screen, and as I recall the camera dollies forward and to the left so that the door is no longer visible. I honestly don't now remember whether Lawrence is shown being dragged into the office. Ferrer is standing near the right side, closer to the camera, initially in profile. O'Toole starts pretty much centered in the picture as he's being tied up, and the camera dollies around to shift him toward the left side of the screen. He turns his head to his left to look at Ferrer, who we keep seeing standing and watching the proceedings, as we more clearly see the expression on his face.

The whole point of this brief scene is that we have no need to guess or speculate about whether or not (according to Lean's movie) Lawrence may have been raped - we KNOW that it did occur. And we need this information to properly interpret Lawrence's state of mind, his attitude toward Turks, and his self-esteem or self-knowledge, throughout the remainder of the film.

I'm very curious whether anyone has a response to this.

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Drucker
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Re: Bridge on the River Kwai & Lawrence of Arabia

#47 Post by Drucker » Sun May 06, 2012 9:34 pm

Can people here confirm whether or not the Kwai blu ray looks good? I have a pretty good DVD of it, but have held off on getting the blu ray as the DVD Beaver review mentions it looks like faces are "stretched." Is this just a product of the correct Aspect Ratio? Just curious.

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Brian C
I hate to be That Pedantic Guy but...
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Re: Bridge on the River Kwai & Lawrence of Arabia

#48 Post by Brian C » Mon May 07, 2012 11:03 am

Drucker wrote:Can people here confirm whether or not the Kwai blu ray looks good? I have a pretty good DVD of it, but have held off on getting the blu ray as the DVD Beaver review mentions it looks like faces are "stretched." Is this just a product of the correct Aspect Ratio? Just curious.
This is explained further down in Gary's review:
Simon wrote:NOTE: Simon tells us: "The 'fat face' look of Bridge on the River Kwai is a classic example of CinemaScope 'mumps' caused by Bausch & Lomb lenses. This problem was only corrected when Panavision brought out their anamorphic lenses in the late 1950s which provided the most accurate anamorphic compression to the plane that was in best focus. Of course this means Panavision films have squeezed backgrounds, but since that area is out of focus it isn't as important or noticeable." (Thanks Simon!)
I didn't notice any problems with the disc myself, but I don't have the technical setup to make my opinion worth much.

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knives
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Re: Bridge on the River Kwai & Lawrence of Arabia

#49 Post by knives » Tue Jul 10, 2012 6:35 pm

This is the closest to a proper thread I could find for this, but it seems that O'Toole has thrown in the hat which is more disappointing for the fact that he really is the last of those great screen alcohol(ics) than anything else. It seems he has two last films coming up though.

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George Kaplan
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Re: Bridge on the River Kwai & Lawrence of Arabia

#50 Post by George Kaplan » Tue Jul 10, 2012 6:44 pm

knives wrote:... it seems that O'Toole has thrown in the hat which is more disappointing for the fact that he really is the last of those great screen alcohol(ics) than anything else. It seems he has two last films coming up though.
Do you mean the towel? Why? What did you hear/read?

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