Kino

[TMDaines]

Incredibly, according to DVD Beaver they have further messed up STORY OF A LOVE AFFAIR, not even matching the already flawed OOP NoShame R1 predecessor...

I really don't understand Kino at times. They're capable of making some very sound releases but there's virtually always at least a few flaws that have been made due to nothing other than boneheaded decision making.

[Tommaso]

Perhaps it's only screencaps taken with different programmes, but to my eyes the new edition seems to have better greyscale than the NoShame. Look at the 4th cap with the two of them in the car especially. More detail in the new one.

[manicsounds]

Wakamatsu's "Caterpillar" DVD review

So far I don't see any reviews for "United Red Army"

[htdm]

^^
"A widescreen 1.85:1 transfer marred by compression artifacts, with blown out outdoor scenes looking especially bad. The film was clearly shot on a low budget (IMDB lists it at $120,000) but the outdoor scenes are inexcusable, especially coupled with tinted subtitles that make it impossible to read the dialogue. This occurs several times in the film, so be prepared to squint."

I'll still pick this up for the film but the transfer doen't sound particularly encouraging.

[med]

Dave Kehr on the Rollin releases.

[Calvin]

Kino are announcing their April slate tomorrow which will apparently be "full of surprises".

[med]

OUT 1

[colinr0380]

I miss the old R1 Redemption covers with random models with no connection to the actual films that looked like they were torn from some cheesy S&M shoot. I probably never would've seen a Rollin movie had I not seen this (NSFW) while strolling through FYE.

I also fondly remember seeing those awful unrelated images on the DVD covers. This is probably common knowledge, but I found out the other day that Redemption is owned by Nigel Wingrove, who also has a hand in artsy goth porn.

I think that Visions of Ecstasy is still the only film banned in the UK on the grounds of blasphemy though the follow up, Sacred Flesh, is availabe in an edited version in the UK and was even once screened by Film 4! Wingrove apparently has a thing for saucy nuns running wild, hence the large number of titles featuring such material on Redemption's UK VHS label back in the day (Flavia The Heretic, Behind Convent Walls, The Other Hell, Killer Nun, The Story of a Cloistered Nun, The Sinful Nuns of St Valentine etc!) - I keep wondering how he reacted to the news of The Devils finally getting a DVD release!

I still look back fondly on the Redemption VHS catalogue though for interspersing such things as M, Haxan, Vampyr and Nosferatu, White Zombie, The Phantom Carriage (and Sjöström's Secret of the Monastry as "The Monastry of Sendormir"), the early Clive Barker shorts, the 'European' (i.e. topless) version of Witchfinder General and Stagefright-Aquarius amongst all the nunsploitation!

Slightly off topic, but surprisingly the BBFC have finally passed Visions of Ecstasy!

[Peacock]

med: OUT 1

Yeah complete with english intertitles

Speaking of intertitles, that timeless source of discussion; Kino on Facebook:

Our policy is to preserve the original intertitles when they exist. Unfortunately, the version of LES VAMPIRES that we are presenting, mastered from a 35mm print restored by the Cinémathèque Française, does not have the original French intertitles. It contains titles that were created at the time of the restoration (set in a modern font), and so we will be replacing these titles with English intertitles.

Personally I don't really care if the original intertitles are lost; I feel the newly created French ones should be included though seeing as they contain the words Feuillade wrote; with replaced intertitles you are entirely reliant on a subtitlist who may not be completely accurate. French is hardly an obscure language for English-speakers, many people can speak even a little bit...

Do Kino really believe the number of people who want replaced intertitles for these early French silents outnumber those who want the original text?

[knives]

Yes and they're probably right. It's the same reason why some people want their screen filled out no matter what.

[Peacock]

But this serial wouldn't attract that kind of audience. I mean fair enough if we are talking about Pulp Fiction or something; but a 1915 French silent series? People will be prepared for 4:3, frame drop-outs, haziness etc; orginal language intertitles won't exactly anger anyone..

[knives]

Not really. The guy who helped get me into film is just the way I described picking up pan and scan copies, never watching subtitled films. Even with silents he doesn't bother to watch them if the intertitles aren't in english. There's also the element of blind buy to consider.

[med]

In cases where the original intertitles exist, then yes, I think Kino (or any other label) should present them. But if the French restoration includes new titles set in a new typeface, then I don't think it's such a big loss not to include those. Think of it in terms of books; outside of poetry or plays, how often do you get books in translation with the original language on one page and the translated version on the other?

[Gregory]

... Even with silents he doesn't bother to watch them if the intertitles aren't in english...

I can understand how inconvenient it must be to read the words off the bottom portion of the screen rather than the middle.

[zedz]

I'm sure this has come up before, but I also believe that English intertitles are obligatory for any films screened on American cable channels, so Kino and other distributors have to do this if they want to take advantage of that potential revenue stream. So unless they're going to go to the expense and trouble of issuing two versions of the film on a disc, the English version will be the default.

Personally, I prefer original intertitles, then original language intertitles subbed, then translated intertitles, in that order, but in most cases it's not that big a deal for me. And when the intertitles have been reconstructed / retranslated in the first place, the distinction seems completely irrelevant. We're lucky to have most of these films in any form.

[domino harvey]

A Star is Born

[htdm]

^^
I wish there had been a comparison to the Image release which apparently utilized the same source.
There doesn't appear to be such a dramatic difference.

[MichaelB]

I'm sure this has come up before, but I also believe that English intertitles are obligatory for any films screened on American cable channels, so Kino and other distributors have to do this if they want to take advantage of that potential revenue stream.

Yes, that's absolutely the case. Flicker Alley would certainly have preferred their Gance titles to have the original French intertitles, but they were essentially faced with the choice between mildly annoying a handful of purists or turning down screening fees from TCM.

Which I'm afraid is a bit of a no-brainer, especially in a market like this where every cent counts.

[Tommaso]

Not sure how this worked in the case of the Gances, i.e. I don't know whether they got their source from France or not. But let's take some of the German silents from Kino as an example. They certainly received a master from FWMS in Germany, and that master certainly had German intertitles. Now Kino's job as a distributor (theatrical and perhaps TV) is to translate the German titles into English and then create new English intertitles. It costs time and money, and they have to create a new master with those English titles. So now they have two masters. Why not take the original master as basis for the DVD and use the second one only for theatrical prints and TV distribution? The only thing they'd have to do is to put the English translation (which at this point they already have!) onto the DVD in the form of subtitles. As the film is a silent film and timing the subs is easy, this can be done in less than one hour. Even if every cent counts, the money that this little extra work costs will come back to them by being able to sell their product to the 'purists', too.

[TMDaines]

Then there's also the option of seemless branching. Whichever way you cut it, there's absolutely no reason the original intertitles couldn't be seen in some form.

[Feego]

I'm sure this has come up before, but I also believe that English intertitles are obligatory for any films screened on American cable channels, so Kino and other distributors have to do this if they want to take advantage of that potential revenue stream.

Yes, that's absolutely the case. Flicker Alley would certainly have preferred their Gance titles to have the original French intertitles, but they were essentially faced with the choice between mildly annoying a handful of purists or turning down screening fees from TCM.

Which I'm afraid is a bit of a no-brainer, especially in a market like this where every cent counts.

So, why is Criterion able to skirt this? When TCM airs The Passion of Joan of Arc, Pandora's Box, and Haxan, they are shown exactly as they are presented on the Criterion discs: with the original intertitles and English subtitles.

[HerrSchreck]

God forbid we were all alive during the silent era when films were shipped to each market ready for insertion of new, market-specific title cards.

My guess is that Kino, who heard the bitching of us purists, reverted to producing dual releases a la POTEMKIN and NOSFERATU, with one disc containing the titles native to the country of origin, and one disc containing english intertitled print which they used for television and theatrical circuit . . and quickly discovered in a market with such tight margins, that this was cost prohibitive. It was a nice gesture while it lasted.

Guys, we are a tiny community of purists versus the aggregation of occasional viewers of silents; remember that Kino was and remains a theatrical/television distributor, even prior to home video. My guess is that, like the CC overscan issue, Kino is catering to the bunch which spends the bulk of their inbound revenue-- not us purists, but whatever portion of America sits in front of the TV and goes to the cinema to see a silent here and there. I personally don't see the point of being enraged about it and lathering the web with neverending froth-- it was the standard for the era that these films existed within. This 'integrity' we speak of was nonexistent. What I found most amusing is the teappot tempest over Murnau's TARTUFFE, whose only watchable, complete, extant print was a nitrate copy of the edit FWM created for the English market, and preserved in the Congress. Kino was actually bashed for keeping the nitrate intertitles of the preservation print, and not adopting the electronically recreated intertitles that the Germans used for their market (and used by MoC). . . when it is known that export prints often maintained different camera angles/second filming positions, cutting continuities, etc.

I understand the sense of a surviving sense of extant prints being museum pieces not to be tampered with, and I more than anyone else adore presentations that are produced within an educational/study context, rather than that of mass market entertainment catering to simpler minds.

But in the end we're all on the same side, and I see no percentage, in this era of dwindling silent releases (with Milestone gone nearly quiet along with the total silence of the Image label which used to drop several silent titles each year . . and these are labels which catered to the mass market by changing the titles to maximize revenue), in slamming one of the teency tiny handful of labels that remain out there trying to get these things to market in at least some form or another. For this I'm very grateful.

[swo17]

with Milestone gone nearly quiet along with the total silence of the Image label which used to drop several silent titles each year

Image at least put out this last year (a title for which Milestone is supposedly working on an even more definitive version). Otherwise though, yeah, slim pickings.

[Max von Mayerling]

Well said, Schreck.

[Tommaso]

While I do see your point, Schreck, this still doesn't answer why Criterion consistently gets away with presenting foreign films with either original intertitles or, probably even more demanding for a 'general' audience, sound films in foreign languages with subtitles. I thought Kino (especially with their silents) were catering more or less to the same or even a smaller audience than Criterion, i.e. the hardcore film enthusiasts.

You have a point about original distribution of silents in foreign countries inevitably involving replaced intertitles. But you know well that often these were not even strictly speaking the same films as the original: often brutally shortened, different camera negatives etc. And it's not clear in many cases whether a comparative 'flop' of a film in a foreign country might perhaps been due to these changes. I simply don't think the original way of distributing silents in the 10s and 20s (or even earlier) can serve as a valuable model for today.

How desperate (and desperately unsuccessful) these distribution practices could be can be seen by the alternate language versions produced in the early sound era. If you compare for instance the marvellous "Der Kongress tanzt" with its English-language alternate version "The Congress Dances" (for the most part different actors, and also less inspired direction), the difference is blatantly obvious. It's a a pale shadow of the original. No wonder that the English language version was a flop in both England and the US. This might be an extreme example, and there were certainly quite good 'adaptations' in the case of other films (think of the French version of "3-Groschen-Oper", for instance), but I mention this example only to show that today one shouldn't make the mistakes of yesteryear again. People's demands and expectations have changed, especially in such a minority market like that for silent films.