World of Wong Kar Wai

[Grand Wazoo]

For the other side of this story, film writer/programmer Steve MacFarlane posted and deleted a tweet yesterday very strongly suggesting that he'd be getting an interview with Christopher Doyle about his falling-out with WKW and how WKW had possibly "sabotaged" the new restorations.

This is a good opportunity to plug Steve's wonderful newsletter Element X Cinema.

[hearthesilence]

For the other side of this story, film writer/programmer Steve MacFarlane posted and deleted a tweet yesterday very strongly suggesting that he'd be getting an interview with Christopher Doyle about his falling-out with WKW and how WKW had possibly "sabotaged" the new restorations.

YIKES.

Didn't Doyle already give an eye-popping bridge-burning interview not too long ago?

[deathbird]

Is it my imagination or is this thing perfumed? It smells like a "Pier 1 Imports" in a college town circa 1976 (firsthand experience, sorry).

Also, why on earth is there printing on the inside of the booklet folds? What kind of perverse, indulgent pranksterism is that? No wonder they call this a "French Fold" -- need a goddamned Guillotine to access the innards

[The Fanciful Norwegian]

Didn't Doyle already give an eye-popping bridge-burning interview not too long ago?

It'd have to be very recent given that he did an interview last year where he said he and Wong had been talking about doing something together, which I'm not exactly holding my breath for. Not that the bridge couldn't have been rebuilt and then burnt again.

[schellenbergk]

As I mentioned in the other thread we're wrapping up "Fellini Fridays" so I will be instituting WKW Wednesdays!!! (Hey you gotta do SOMETHING in these Covid Times to track the days....)

[Calvin]

An update from Novamedia, since I know some of us were waiting on their release(s):

"Director Wong Kar-wai's remastering works will be released individually, and the first one will be "In the Mood for Love" Also, it will be released as an exclusive steelbook.
Currently, it is under design confirmation, and future remastering works by Wong Kar-wai's, such as Happy Together and Fallen Angles will be released as exclusive steel books.
When it comes to disc configuration, we've produced Blu-ray discs and UHD discs (including HDR), and there's little difference in quality, so we're going to make it a exclusive steelbook of remastered Blu-ray (1 disc) versions."

A bit disappointing, I don't know what Nova's threshold is for "little difference".

[MichaelB]

Ah, so it's Fallen Angles that we've been talking about all along.

There was I thinking he'd been messing about with Fallen Angels. Phew!

[Mr Sausage]

Non angeli, sed Angli.

[Finch]

revisionist In The Mood For Love at caps-a-holic

That green looks revolting!

[mhofmann]

revisionist In The Mood For Love at caps-a-holic

That green looks revolting!

Ouch.

And green aside, it looks like this new transfer has been de-grained quite a bit. An "unretouched" 4K scan would have somewhat finer grain than the previous 2K master, but not a lot less of it, like we see here.

[Gregory]

Last year I sold the WKW Blu-rays I owned in anticipation of this set. Fortunately I forgot to sell In the Mood for Love, as I will not be adding this set to my collection after all, for obvious reasons. I also preemptively sold off nearly all the Tati, Varda, Bergman, and Fellini stuff that I could when those box sets were being prepared, a practice that this whole WKW affair has made me reconsider at least if a filmmaker is still living and there's any chance they'll tinker with or reimagine their past works.

[Finch]

Glad it's not just me thinking, where did all of the grain go?

[hearthesilence]

Last year I sold the WKW Blu-rays I owned in anticipation of this set. Fortunately I forgot to sell In the Mood for Love, as I will not be adding this set to my collection after all, for obvious reasons. I also preemptively sold off nearly all the Tati, Varda, Bergman, and Fellini stuff that I could when those box sets were being prepared, a practice that this whole WKW affair has made me reconsider at least if a filmmaker is still living and there's any chance they'll tinker with or reimagine their past works.

Some earlier titles made me reconsider for the same reason, and man, that was a pain in the ass - selling off shit than rebuying it all over again.

[Drucker]

I know it's ridiculous for me, a simpleton on the internet, to question Wong Kar Wai's methods, but it's really funny to see the output of In The Mood for Love with his commentary about re-envisioning his films for where he currently is in his life and accounting for 20 years of aging. "Ah, I just feel if I was in an impossible relationship with a neighbor in my hallway....I would feel so much greener about it today.

[soundchaser]

A man never steps in the same river twice, especially when that river has a serious algae problem.

[tenia]

A man might never steps in the same river twice, but a colorist maybe.
It also looks quite smooth indeed, something I didn't notice when I saw the restoration in theaters (while I did spot how Flowers of Shanghai was thoroughly degrained)

[hearthesilence]

Days of Being Wild...bluray.com

Did the movie really look this cyan? I've seen it projected in 35mm long before the pandemic and the new restorations (no earlier than 2009), but is it possible the English-subtitled print got the color wrong?

FWIW, the very noticeable but far more subtle greenish tint that you see on the Hong Kong Blu-ray (the kind of green tint a relative used to have on his old pair of eyeglasses) looks like it could be right - I didn't know about it so I couldn't compare it after that screening years ago.

[Boosmahn]

The changes to In the Mood for Love baffle me. What does Wong Kar-wai gain by making it this green? With Memories of Murder, at least it can be argued the darker/greener colors give the film a grittier look; here, I've got nothing. Maybe WKW is trying to mix the film's famous reds and new greens to suggest it's been a Christmas movie this whole time?!

[Grand Wazoo]

Days of Being Wild...bluray.com

Did the movie really look this cyan? I've seen it projected in 35mm long before the pandemic and the new restorations (no earlier than 2009), but is it possible the English-subtitled print got the color wrong?

FWIW, the very noticeable but far more subtle greenish tint that you see on the Hong Kong Blu-ray (the kind of green tint a relative used to have on his old pair of eyeglasses) looks like it could be right - I didn't know about it so I couldn't compare it after that screening years ago.

Wasn't there an interview with Christopher Doyle where he said this was originally totally green and no home video version ever got it right? If so then maybe this is the only new presentation which is more accurate to the original prints. Or perhaps I'm misremembering and just desperately want some aspect of this set not to suck.

[tenia]

The changes to In the Mood for Love baffle me. What does Wong Kar-wai gain by making it this green? With Memories of Murder, at least it can be argued the darker/greener colors give the film a grittier look; here, I've got nothing. Maybe WKW is trying to mix the film's famous reds and new greens to suggest it's been a Christmas movie this whole time?!

We don't know for sure if he wanted it green willingly or if it's just a side-effect from the lab color signature.

[grayskale]

The changes to In the Mood for Love baffle me. What does Wong Kar-wai gain by making it this green? With Memories of Murder, at least it can be argued the darker/greener colors give the film a grittier look; here, I've got nothing. Maybe WKW is trying to mix the film's famous reds and new greens to suggest it's been a Christmas movie this whole time?!

We don't know for sure if he wanted it green willingly or if it's just a side-effect from the lab color signature.

I sampled a scene from the new ITMFL - there is a scene at the earlier section of the film - where they first move in - one of the moving guys that Chow Mo-Wan is conversing with, is wearing a sleeveless shirt with daylight streaming through the window - he is not lit with interior lamps etc - it looked white on my Sony LCD set to Expert 1 - is his shirt white or green or everyone's display i wonder?

If indeed it is a side effect of the grading work - wouldn't his shirt be tinted green as well?

[hearthesilence]

Days of Being Wild...bluray.com

Did the movie really look this cyan? I've seen it projected in 35mm long before the pandemic and the new restorations (no earlier than 2009), but is it possible the English-subtitled print got the color wrong?

FWIW, the very noticeable but far more subtle greenish tint that you see on the Hong Kong Blu-ray (the kind of green tint a relative used to have on his old pair of eyeglasses) looks like it could be right - I didn't know about it so I couldn't compare it after that screening years ago.

Wasn't there an interview with Christopher Doyle where he said this was originally totally green and no home video version ever got it right? If so then maybe this is the only new presentation which is more accurate to the original prints. Or perhaps I'm misremembering and just desperately want some aspect of this set not to suck.

DVDBeaver has the quote from an interview pre-dating Blu-ray releases where he said they had to get the Japanese DVD because other DVD's took out the green altogether to make it look "normal." Maybe there's more to it, but if the quote can be taken as a complete assessment of the DVD's he had seen, it was the difference between the presence of a green tint and the removal of it altogether.

[tenia]

If indeed it is a side effect of the grading work - wouldn't his shirt be tinted green as well?

It can has an improper sheen of green (or rather a lack of blue and red) without being overtly green. The same way that with Eclair's gradings, many white shirts look light blue now. They don't look navy blue, but they do look like the grading either is extremely cold or the shirts are light blue. In any case, it's visible but it looks more like a shift towards a bluer colder grading that a blanker tint. The same is true for Ritrovata's grading : things aren't green or yellow, but shifted towards these colors.

[yoloswegmaster]

I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that a company called One Cool was behind the color timing (under the supervision of WKW), and that Ritrovata was only used for the scanning and restoration.

[tenia]

I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that a company called One Cool was behind the color timing (under the supervision of WKW), and that Ritrovata was only used for the scanning and restoration.

Yes, that was my understanding too, but the tech credits at the end of ITMFL weren't that clear, and some of those restorations' gradings clearly look Ritrovata'd.