BD 245-246 Straight Shooting & Hell Bent: Two Films by John Ford

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Finch
Joined: Mon Jul 07, 2008 5:09 pm
Location: Edinburgh, UK

BD 245-246 Straight Shooting & Hell Bent: Two Films by John Ford

#1 Post by Finch » Thu Jan 28, 2021 2:08 pm

Straight Shooting & Hell Bent: Two Films by John Ford (Blu-ray)

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SYNOPSIS

The Masters of Cinema Series is proud to present two early features from John Ford (credited on both films as Jack Ford) in their UK debuts on home video, fully restored in 4K.

Straight Shooting is a landmark in the history of the Western. The first feature directed by Ford, it revived the career of Harry Carey who gives a rough and tumble performance here as a hired gun who turns on his employers to defend an innocent farmer and his family.

In Hell Bent, ‘Cheyenne Harry’ (Harry Carey playing the same character from Straight Shooting) flees the law after a poker game shootout, and arrives in the town of Rawhide, where he becomes friendly with local cowboy Cimarron Bill (Duke Lee) and dance hall girl Bess Thurston (Neva Gerber). When gang leader Beau Ross (Jospeh Harris) kidnaps Bess, Harry goes to desperate lengths travelling across the deadly desert in order to free Bess from the hard-bitten Ross.
SPECIAL FEATURES

Limited Edition O-Card slipcase and reversible sleeve artwork [2000 copies]
Both features presented in 1080p on Blu-ray from 4K restorations undertaken by Universal Pictures, available for the first time ever on home video in the UK
Straight Shooting – Score by Michael Gatt
Hell Bent – Score by Zachary Marsh
Straight Shooting – Audio commentary by film historian Joseph McBride, author of Searching for John Ford: A Life
Hell Bent – Audio commentary by film historian Joseph McBride
Brand new interview with film critic and author Kim Newman
Bull Scores a Touchdown – Video essay by Tag Gallagher
A Horse or a Mary? – Video essay by Tag Gallagher
Archival audio interview from 1970 with John Ford by Joseph McBride
A short fragment of the lost film Hitchin’ Posts (dir. John Ford, 1920) preserved by the Library of Congress
A collector’s booklet featuring writing by Richard Combs, Phil Hoad, and Tag Gallagher

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L.A.
Joined: Thu May 28, 2009 7:33 am
Location: Helsinki, Finland

Re: BD 245-246 Straight Shooting & Hell Bent: Two Films by John Ford

#2 Post by L.A. » Thu Jan 28, 2021 2:24 pm

On Facebook they mention this:
STRAIGHT SHOOTING: the Czech version - inclusion TBC
Hopefully they can get this. Should be easier to acquire than the Champion Festival version of Mothra from Toho? 🤔

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The Fanciful Norwegian
Joined: Tue Nov 02, 2004 2:24 pm
Location: Teegeeack

Re: BD 245-246 Straight Shooting & Hell Bent: Two Films by John Ford

#3 Post by The Fanciful Norwegian » Thu Jan 28, 2021 2:34 pm

Argh, and I just bought Straight Shooting at the last Kino Lorber sale. At least I passed on their Hell Bent since it wasn't part of the sale.

Very curious to see the Czech version if that's possible. My understanding (correct me if I'm wrong) is that it's the sole surviving print and was the basis for the restoration, so if it is included, would it be an unrestored version with Czech titles and perhaps sans tinting?

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movielocke
Joined: Fri Jan 18, 2008 12:44 am

Re: BD 245-246 Straight Shooting & Hell Bent: Two Films by John Ford

#4 Post by movielocke » Thu Jan 28, 2021 7:04 pm

The kino releases are superb and this is better in combining them in one release, the commentaries are very good,slightly repetitive of each other.

Interesting that I listened to the interview with Ford around the same time I listened to the interview with king and McLean on the gunfighter, all done at about the same era. It’s amazing how the leading questions of McBride (talk about this film/person specifically, comment on this other persons comment) yielded non responses, but the open questions of the AFI “who were you working with on pictures back then” “what was the process” lead to fruitful informative elaborate reminiscences.

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L.A.
Joined: Thu May 28, 2009 7:33 am
Location: Helsinki, Finland

Re: BD 245-246 Straight Shooting & Hell Bent: Two Films by John Ford

#5 Post by L.A. » Sat Apr 03, 2021 10:21 am


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Maltic
Joined: Sat Oct 10, 2020 1:36 am

Re: BD 245-246 Straight Shooting & Hell Bent: Two Films by John Ford

#6 Post by Maltic » Mon Apr 05, 2021 7:01 pm

A probable contender for package of the year.
movielocke wrote:
Thu Jan 28, 2021 7:04 pm
The kino releases are superb and this is better in combining them in one release, the commentaries are very good,slightly repetitive of each other.

Interesting that I listened to the interview with Ford around the same time I listened to the interview with king and McLean on the gunfighter, all done at about the same era. It’s amazing how the leading questions of McBride (talk about this film/person specifically, comment on this other persons comment) yielded non responses, but the open questions of the AFI “who were you working with on pictures back then” “what was the process” lead to fruitful informative elaborate reminiscences.
I count 11 McBride commentaries on various Ford DVD and BD releases.

Straight Shooting (1917)
Hell Bent (1918)
3 Bad Men (1926)
Pilgrimage (1933)
The Hurricane (1937)
Young Mr. Lincoln (1939)
The Grapes of Wrath (1940)
How Green Was My Valley (1941)
My Darling Clementine (1946)
The Quiet Man (1952)
Cheyenne Autumn (1964)

Must be a record. He's one of the best around, too, although he has a propensity for armchair psychologizing and is perhaps more of a raconteur than a reliable historian.

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Drucker
Your Future our Drucker
Joined: Wed May 18, 2011 9:37 am

Re: BD 245-246 Straight Shooting & Hell Bent: Two Films by John Ford

#7 Post by Drucker » Mon Apr 05, 2021 9:08 pm

I love his Orson Welles books and have seen him speak at Film Forum but he's absolutely the way Welles depicts him in The Other Side Of the Wind.

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Fred Holywell
Joined: Thu Jun 10, 2010 11:45 pm

Re: BD 245-246 Straight Shooting & Hell Bent: Two Films by John Ford

#8 Post by Fred Holywell » Tue Apr 06, 2021 1:01 pm

Always appreciate having McBride's commentaries on the Ford films. I seem to remember reading when the WB John Ford Film Collection (The Lost Patrol, The Informer, Mary of Scotland, Sergeant Rutledge, Cheyenne Autumn) came out, that he'd hoped to record commentaries for some of the other titles in the set, but only managed to do the one for Cheyenne Autumn.

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Drucker
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Re: BD 245-246 Straight Shooting & Hell Bent: Two Films by John Ford

#9 Post by Drucker » Sun Apr 25, 2021 12:38 pm

This is an enjoyable package. I particularly liked Straight Shooting but more than that, it's really fun to visit these films after I've digested so much of the rest of Ford's oeuvre. There's a comment somewhere in the booklet that Ford set out to make a different kind of Western here, more of a 'character study than a shoot-em-up' and I know it's probably obvious but I feel like next time I revisit his films it'll be something I think about. The one thing missing in these films to a degree is a real sense of community that makes Ford's sound features so wonderful. Here, Harey Carey is front and center and it's hard to keep straight the rest of the cast. The films also clearly owe a bit to Griffith at this point, but there are some lovely signs of what would come from Ford.

Regarding the McBride audio interview, I have to say it's not that great. It's fun hearing Ford be crotchety, I suppose, but as he admits in the intro, you're really encountering McBride learn to interview in real time.

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