Recent Film Restorations

[Stefan Andersson]

Details about the There Was a Father resto:
https://www.tellerreport.com/life/2023- ... 4OOqn.html

This article from May 2023 seems to be about Tokkan Kozo, shortened, retitled and rereleased:
https://www.tellerreport.com/life/2023- ... f-T42.html

Details re: Deep Crimson:
https://mk2films.com/en/film/carmin-pro ... o-carmesi/

[beamish14]

Details re: Deep Crimson:
https://mk2films.com/en/film/carmin-pro ... o-carmesi/

Interesting that this is 25 minutes longer. I thought that the original theatrical cut had already received a 2k restoration several years ago. It’s a wonderful movie, and I keep hoping that Criterion will release it or one of Ripstein’s other works

[Stefan Andersson]

Some restorations from the 2023 Cinema Rediscovered in the UK:

The Passionate Stranger, Muriel Box:
https://www.watershed.co.uk/whatson/120 ... rol-morley

Together, Lorenza Mazzetti:
https://www.watershed.co.uk/whatson/120 ... e-together

Salomé, Nazimova:
https://www.watershed.co.uk/whatson/12044/salom

Yield to the Night:
https://www.watershed.co.uk/whatson/120 ... -the-night

Undercurrent, Kozaburo Yoshimura:
https://www.watershed.co.uk/whatson/120 ... ru-no-kawa

[beamish14]

New 4K restoration of Fran Rubel Kuzui’s charming and underrated Tokyo Pop (1988) is making the rounds. It was distributed on VHS by WB, but Kino now handles it

[hearthesilence]

Andrew Davis has been working on a 30th-anniversary restoration of The Fugitive that will hit theaters this fall in a limited release.

That's a detail buried in an oral history on the making of the film that's entertaining to read. Like the extras and the commentary track on Batman, it's again bewildering how such an expensive film can be done so haphazardly. In this case, it seems to be dictated by scheduling - when Ford was available, when they wanted to release it, and the ridiculous amount of marketing they needed to plan, create (using material made for the film) and roll out leading up to that release date.

Just a few excerpts:

Joe Pantoliano: We were lucky. Look, I’d be lying to you if I didn’t tell you that I think everybody thought this was going to be a real dud, except for Andy Davis.

Daniel Roebuck: Harrison Ford said in front of me when we were in the water, so I can attest that he said it. He goes, “Oh, man, this is going to be my Hudson Hawk.”

Joe Pantoliano: We were headed to Chicago from Cherokee. Tommy [Lee Jones]’s like, “Hey, Joey, we’re going to have fun in Chicago. Do you like Chinese food?” “Yeah.” “We’ll eat a lot of Chinese food, and you like Italian food?” “Oh, hell yeah.” “Yeah, well, we’re going to eat a lot of Italian food because we’re going to have fun. We don’t have to worry about this script ’cause let’s face it, nobody’s going to win an Academy Award on this one.”

Andrew Davis: Tommy thought this was going to end his career.

Tommy Lee Jones: I remember being in the giant basement of that hotel, surrounded by hanging bags of laundry. I was standing there speaking out to Harrison’s character. And there was nothing there except big bags of laundry. And I remember thinking in the back of my mind, “I’ll never work again. This is never going to work. And the best thing I can do is be as clear, concise, and coherent as possible, deliver these lines as cleanly and dutifully as possible, and maybe I’ll get another job one day, somewhere down the line.”

Jeb Stuart: And I have to tell you — you may not hear this from other people — but I remember laughing about it with Harrison a lot. We didn’t really think we were going to ever work again after this movie.

[much later, after Ford saw a cut and then the studio became enthusiastic after an initial viewing]

Jeb Stuart: I took my family on a vacation to Europe after the shoot ended, and I was over in Italy someplace and I got a call from L.A. Andy and Harrison were both on the call. Harrison said, “I think we’re going to work again.”

My favorite anecdote:

Joe Pantoliano:

Spoiler

I go running into Andy’s trailer. I go, “Andy, what the fuck? You can’t kill me.” He goes, “Why?” I said, “What if there’s a sequel?” He says, “All right, we won’t kill you. We won’t kill you.” We shot it before CGI. I was thinking, “I’m going to make it so they can’t make me dead.” And so I just started moaning and making lots of noise on the ground. Andy says, “Cut,” and all of a sudden I see these pair of blue jeans walk up to me, and I look up the leg like a closeup, and it reveals Harrison Ford staring down at me. He’s shaking his head. And I go, “What?” And he goes, “You should be dead.” I said, “What if there’s a sequel, Harrison?” He laughed, and then he looked down at me and he said, “Listen, there’s not going to be any sequel because I won’t be in it.” And I said, “Well, fuck you. Who needs you? We’ll just chase another 20-million-dollar asshole through the woods!” And he was on the floor laughing.

[colinr0380]

Well, that explains U.S. Marhsals!

[Calvin]

Bresson's Four Nights of a Dreamer and Deville's Nuit d'été en ville are in the recent round CNC funded restorations

[Stefan Andersson]

Borzage´s The Lady, Street of Forgotten Men, Adventurer (Chaplin, new restoration), Stella Dallas (1925), Gance´s La Dixieme Symphonie, Three Weeks (1924), and other restorations:
https://www.moma.org/calendar/film/5596

More on the restoration of Street of Forgotten Men:
https://www.popmatters.com/louise-brook ... gotten-men

Lubitsch´s The Marriage Circle, plus films by Richard Eichberg, Germaine Dulac, Anthony Asquith, Mikhail Kaufman (brother of Boris Kaufman), Gustav Ucicky, and others:
https://www.internationale-stummfilmtag ... n-calendar

[Stefan Andersson]

Bresson's Four Nights of a Dreamer and Deville's Nuit d'été en ville are in the recent round CNC funded restorations

Plus:
Pépé le Moko
Shoot the Piano Player
C´est la faute de Adam, Jacqueline Audry
Cyrano et d´Artagnan, Gance
La proie pour l´ombre, Astruc

[Stefan Andersson]

City of Women:
https://www.locarnofestival.ch/en/progr ... l=en&eid=0

La Paloma, Daniel Schmid:
https://www.locarnofestival.ch/en/progr ... l=en&eid=0

[yoloswegmaster]

Do you know if the status surrounding these films getting a home release has changed? You mentioned before some years ago that some of Hou's films can't be released or seen if they involved money (I hope I'm remembering some semblance of this correctly) and that prevents them from getting more widespread screenings and a commercial DVD/Blu-Ray release?

Chiu has said he wants the City of Sadness remaster to be a theatrical exclusive for three years, which does at least imply some kind of home release way down the line. Chiu has also said he's fielding offers from distributors in a number of countries including the U.S., so whatever was keeping it out of distribution doesn't seem to be a problem anymore. A City of Sadness has also been commercially re-released in Hong Kong, so it's definitely available outside of Taiwan. The Puppetmaster is the other Hou film that's been in a similar limbo, so I'm guessing anything that goes for A City of Sadness applies to it as well.

At least we can surmise that Criterion/Janus have contacted Chiu, as Bong Joon-Ho states in this video (at the 14:35 mark) that Criterion has tried to release City of Sadness for a while now but the project failed each time.

[senseabove]

I know there was a 35mm restoration of Scorsese’s New York, New York done just before the pandemic, as I saw the new print in LA when the New Bev reopened. Does anybody know if there was a DCP created at the same time? All the coverage of that restoration premiere I can find only mentions the 35mm print if they mention any format information at all…

[Stefan Andersson]

Alraune, A Midsummer Night´s Dream (Germany, 1925), The Johnstown Flood starring George O´Brien and Janet Gaynor, The Dragon Painter starring Sessue Hayakawa, and more:
https://silentfilm.org/library/?library ... ent=12&st=

Restoration of Beau Geste (1929):
https://www.nitrateville.com/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=34766

[beamish14]

Trailer for the Caligula restoration

[Stefan Andersson]

Some upcoming German restorations:
Die Augen der Mumie Ma, Lubitsch
Die Andere, Lamprecht
Land of Silence and Darkness, Herzog
End of Violence, Wenders
Malina, Schroeter
Winnetou 1-3, Reinl
Parsifal, Syberberg
Eifersucht, Grune
Source: https://www.ffa.de/pressemitteilungen-d ... ilmen.html

[yoloswegmaster]

I know there was a 35mm restoration of Scorsese’s New York, New York done just before the pandemic, as I saw the new print in LA when the New Bev reopened. Does anybody know if there was a DCP created at the same time? All the coverage of that restoration premiere I can find only mentions the 35mm print if they mention any format information at all…

I'm also interested in knowing about this since Glenn Kenny mentions in his Making of Goodfellas book that he was hosting a Q&A with Irwin Winkler at a screening of the restoration. Sadly I can't find any info about this Q&A screening, so I'm not sure if it was screened from a DCP or a 35mm print.

[Calvin]

Japanese silent film Orochi, which stars Tsumasaburō Bandō, has been restored in 4K.

There have also been new 4K restorations of Suzuki's Taisho Trilogy.

[Stefan Andersson]

NYFF Revivals:

https://www.filmlinc.org/nyff2023/daily ... announced/

Abraham´s Valley (Oliveira, 203 mins.), Pressure (Ové), Woman on the Beach (Renoir), films by Niki de Saint Phalle, Paul Vecchiali, Lee Grant, Tewfik Saleh, Nancy Savoca and others.

[beamish14]

NYFF Revivals:

https://www.filmlinc.org/nyff2023/daily ... announced/

Abraham´s Valley (Oliveira, 203 mins.), Pressure (Ové), Woman on the Beach (Renoir), films by Niki de Saint Phalle, Paul Vecchiali, Lee Grant, Tewfik Saleh, Nancy Savoca and others.

Wow, Tell Me a Riddle. That’s a real neglected gem. I think WB still owns it

[ianthemovie]

Un reve plus long que la nuit sounds fascinating; can anyone recommend it?

[Red Screamer]

Un rêve plus long que la nuit is a fun underground film with wild handmade art design but I'd also say, like some other films made by artists primarily known for gallery work, it's long on concept and a little short on craft and follow-through. One Miyazakian sequence with a giant steampunk (drum-operated?) machine running in the forest at night was the highlight for me. Recommended as a midnight movie, subgenre: feminist surrealism, subcategory: Alice in Wonderland narratives.

[ianthemovie]

Thanks! I'll confess to having a weakness for feminist surrealism, midnight movies, and Alice in Wonderland, so I'll have to keep an eye out for this going forward.

[jmj713]

jmj713, I very enthusiastically second more exposure to the titles you mentioned - City Zero, Dead Man's Letters, Kin-Dza-Dza and Per Aspera Ad Astra.

I was happy to hear about the upcoming Blu-ray of City Zero. Kin-Dza-Dza already has stellar Blu-ray editions in Japan and Germany (although not English-friendly). A restoration of Per Aspera Ad Astra was famously botched by the director's son. That "restored" version should be avoided like a plague. There were rumors of the original version been also restored and shown in UK in 2019.

The other dystopian Russian films I can recommend (although from a slightly later period) are Barabaniada (Drumroll) (1993) by Sergei Ovcharov, Okno v Parizh (Window to Paris) (1993) and Bakenbardy (Sideburns) (1990) by Yuri Mamin, and Okraina (Outskirts) (1998) by Pyotr Lutsik.

Apparently there is an HD version of Dead Man's Letters? https://kion.ru/video/movie/637578391

Was this actually restored?

[yoloswegmaster]

Hopefully it's an actual HD transfer and not an upscale from the DVD. Have any of the Lenfilm titles been restored?

Speaking of Dead Man's Letters, there's a copy that's been floating around for the past few months and was sourced from a 35mm print (if you can't find it, just PM me). I'm surprised that a print of this even exists.

[jmj713]

A restoration of Per Aspera Ad Astra was famously botched by the director's son. That "restored" version should be avoided like a plague. There were rumors of the original version been also restored and shown in UK in 2019.

Saw this Blu-ray from Ostalgica that came out in May 2022. Even though not mentioned on the back cover and in the menu, did some research and according to this site it has Russian language soundtrack and English subtitles and seems to be the original version.

For L.A. and others interested in Ostalgica's Blu-ray of Per Aspera Ad Astra. I have received the Blu-ray yesterday and watched the film.

The good:

This is indeed the original version, complete with a brief nude scene, which has been partially deleted in Russian domestic version. It is the best version currently on any home video format (not that there are too many offerings to choose from). The resolution is higher than I've ever seen for this film on video - lots of new details are now visible. The sound is clear and the dialogue is easily discernable. It contains both the original Russian soundtrack and German language dub. It has German and English subtitles. The extras include the alternative opening credits from German version, stills and international poster images.

The not-so-good:

The image is cropped to a degree, although not as bad as in some DVD versions. The color is somewhat off - it seems to have too much red. Originally this film was released in two parts - but this version is spliced into a single film, missing credits in the second part, and the parts' titles.

The bad:

Overall the image is too dark, especially in the second part of the film. The contrast is excessive and the details in the dark areas of the image are lost entirely in many scenes. The image is rife with digital artifacts - this gets worse as the the film progresses. There are many instances of macroblocking, color banding, ghosting, shimmering - you name it. In a couple of scenes there was the weird effect I have last seen in the old Ruscico DVD of Stalker - when parts of the image are slightly shaking against the background (I forgot the proper word for it). English subtitles are of poor quality, with many instances of incorrect or partially correct translation. Here is one example. When cosmonauts are entering the dead spaceship in the beginning of the film, one of them mutters ""Кунтскамера какая-то!" The word Kunstkamera or Kunstkammer (German for "Culture Room" (literally) or "Art Chamber", typically used for a "cabinet of curiosities"). So, essentially, the cosmonaut is saying "What a freak show". The English subtitles say "It's a strange camera".

Overall: I am super-excited that this neglected masterpiece has finally made a leap into high definition media, and hope that this much welcomed but underwhelming edition will be bested by one of our favorite boutique labels before too long. The film has not lost any of its power and is still a joy to watch. One of a kind work for sure, and highly recommended.

Thanks for the detailed breakdown. It's unfortunate that it's not up to par, but as you said, hopefully this is a step in the right direction and gets this film more exposure.