Recent Film Restorations

[beamish14]

The painstaking process of restoring Hard Boiled

[Stefan Andersson]

Screenbound restorations, including Wonderwall (directors cut), Glastonbury Fayre, Blue Blood (Oliver Reed):
https://screenbound.co.uk/library-title ... tatus=3391
https://screenbound.co.uk/library-title ... tatus=3035
https://screenbound.co.uk/library-title ... tatus=3037

[Stefan Andersson]

Joan Littlewood´s Sparrow´s Cant Sing restored in 4K from OCN:
https://www.hometheaterforum.com/commun ... ay.386113/

[HinkyDinkyTruesmith]

Is that disc of Sparrows Can't Sing actually new, or is it the same as the Vintage Classics release from years ago? The extras are identical.

[Calvin]

It looks like the next big restoration from the Film Heritage Foundation will be Sholay.

[JamesF]

It looks like the next big restoration from the Film Heritage Foundation will be Sholay.

This is playing at Bologna next month and I can’t wait to see the results. The previous HD master was a monstrous 3D vandalisation so revisionist it would make George Lucas blush, so hopefully it undoes all of that. I hope they restored Sippy’s original, longer cut with the more violent ending too.

[Stefan Andersson]

A Season of Classic Films 2025:
https://ace-film.eu/wp-content/uploads/ ... e-2025.pdf
https://ace-film.eu/

Some titles:

El Amor Brujo (1967), w/ Antonio Gades, 4K
Riso amaro, 4K
Erdgift (1919), 4K
Ecce bombo, 4K

[Stefan Andersson]

María Luisa Bemberg films restored:
https://www.cinemamentire.co.uk/daring- ... sa-bemberg

[Stefan Andersson]

Diferente, Delgado 1962:
https://indielisboa.com/en/film/different/

Iracema, Bodanzky/Zenna 1975:
https://indielisboa.com/en/film/different/

Binka Zhelyazkova films:
https://indielisboa.com/en/section/retrospective/
https://www.bfi.org.uk/features/indieli ... ckets-kids
https://www.barbican.org.uk/our-story/p ... helyazkova

[Stefan Andersson]

Restoring Days and Nights in the Forest and The Girls (Peries, 1978):
https://filmheritagefoundation.co.in/fi ... 1970-supp/
https://filmheritagefoundation.co.in/fi ... ra-peries/
https://variety.com/2025/film/news/cann ... 236400199/

[Stefan Andersson]

It looks like the next big restoration from the Film Heritage Foundation will be Sholay.

This is playing at Bologna next month and I can’t wait to see the results. The previous HD master was a monstrous 3D vandalisation so revisionist it would make George Lucas blush, so hopefully it undoes all of that. I hope they restored Sippy’s original, longer cut with the more violent ending too.

Restoring the original ending is in the plans:
https://www.newsbytesapp.com/news/enter ... sary/story

The original version is/was released once on DVD:
https://www.timesnownews.com/entertainm ... -151590555

[Yakushima]

A new 4K restoration (by Kadokawa Corporation) of the complete 137-minute version of Masayuki Suo's SHALL WE DANCE? will be screened at Film Forum Friday, May 30 – Thursday, June 12. I hope one of our favorite labels will take advantage of this new resto and give it a physical release.

[dwk]

Pretty sure that Film Movement has already licensed Shall We Dance.

[sabbath]

Right. Along with the new 4K restorations of the director's Fancy Dance (1989) and Sumo Do, Sumo Don't (1992) as well.

According to Film Movement, their restorations were "done by Tokyo Koon Co. Ltd., and supervised by the cinematographers. The original camera negative underwent a 4K scan by Imagica Entertainment Media Services, Inc. (Scanity by Digital Film Technology)"

[Yakushima]

Right. Along with the new 4K restorations of the director's Fancy Dance (1989) and Sumo Do, Sumo Don't (1992) as well.

According to Film Movement, their restorations were "done by Tokyo Koon Co. Ltd., and supervised by the cinematographers. The original camera negative underwent a 4K scan by Imagica Entertainment Media Services, Inc. (Scanity by Digital Film Technology)"

Fantastic news! Thank you Dwk for heads-up and Sabbath for sharing the links!

[Stefan Andersson]

New grants decided for French film restorations, including:
La Planète Sauvage
Parade, Tati
La femme en bleu, Deville
Several Jean Image films
Dans ma peau
Yvette and Tour de chant, Cavalcanti
Journees a la campagne, Ruiz
La charrette fantôme, Duvivier
La Chartreuse de Parme, Christian-Jaque
Le parfum d´Yvonne
Rois et Reine and Un conte de Noël, Desplechin
https://www.cnc.fr/professionnels/aides ... ine_190901

[Stefan Andersson]

Ecce Homo Homolka, Papousek:
https://www.kviff.com/en/news/5165-kvif ... mo-homolka

Play it as it Lays, Cinema Rediscovered, Bristol:
https://www.watershed.co.uk/whatson/133 ... as-it-lays

Kalamita, Chytilová:
https://www.watershed.co.uk/whatson/133 ... a-calamity

Los Golfos, Saura, uncensored:
https://www.watershed.co.uk/whatson/133 ... elinquents

Cinema Rediscovered, full program w/ several UK premieres:
https://www.watershed.co.uk/whatson/sea ... discovered

[hearthesilence]

Kalamita, Chytilová:
https://www.watershed.co.uk/whatson/133 ... a-calamity

Saw this at MoMA and it is a great-looking restoration. From my original post:

...looked wonderful...a real gem and it's my first time seeing Bolek Polívka, who I didn't realize was a mime - while his performance is loaded with physical bits, they're all so organic and naturalistically executed that they seem to play like everyday reactions to frustrating scenarios. Highly entertaining film all around.

[Stefan Andersson]

Restoration of Shanghai Blues, including a cut blackface scene and soundtrack alterations:
https://x.com/Futurhythm/status/1890427884059123860

"Hark decided to re-dub the whole film during the 4K restoration, now every character speaks different languages based on their background settings (Mandarin, Shanghainese, Cantonese or Mandarin with different accents) and sadly this became the official and the only approved track for this film now."
https://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=36548

"apparently Spectrum included the cut scene on the regular Blu-ray disc. I don't have my copy yet but I'm told that it is included. The strange thing is that it may not even be in the menu. You may have to manually play the correct M2TS file in order to access it. (EDIT: It is in the Blu's menu, and marked as a deleted scene. It's definitely from a good HD source. Somebody with editing skills could add this back to the rest of the film and add a decent copy of the original dub.)

Also, the audio is wonky. There are two dubs included: A "Cantonese 2024" dub that apparently doesn't even use Cantonese but instead uses Mandarin and Shanghainese, and a "Cantonese 1984" track that is mostly the original Cantonese but still has some tinkering applied. Supposedly, it's not possible to license the original Cantonese dub, or even apply it from a different source (e.g., the LaserDisc)."
https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread.php?t=373319 - post 12

[tenia]

Not sure what the tinkering applied to the 1984 soundtrack is. The French Spectrum release includes it along the new soundtrack, and I compared it to my 2005 French DVD and the 2 tracks sounded very similar. If new sound effects or other typical HK remasters shanenigans have been added, I haven't found any (but I haven't compared 100% of them, so maybe I missed them), so it just sounded like a different presentation of the same content (like when the BFI includes a restored and an unrestored tracks for some of their Ozu releases).

A new 4K restoration (by Kadokawa Corporation) of the complete 137-minute version of Masayuki Suo's SHALL WE DANCE? will be screened at Film Forum Friday, May 30 – Thursday, June 12. I hope one of our favorite labels will take advantage of this new resto and give it a physical release.

Fairly certain this is only "new" to the US : Japan in 2014 and France in 2023 released the movie on BD in a 137 min cut from a 4k remaster.

[Stefan Andersson]

Ein Walzertraum (Ludwig Berger, 1925) restored:
https://www.stummfilm-magazin.de/aktuel ... d-auf-arte
https://www.staatstheater-mainz.com/ver ... niekonzert

Film is based on an operetta by Oscar Straus; also basis for Lubitsch´s The Smiling Lieutenant.

[andyli]

Not sure what the tinkering applied to the 1984 soundtrack is. The French Spectrum release includes it along the new soundtrack, and I compared it to my 2005 French DVD and the 2 tracks sounded very similar. If new sound effects or other typical HK remasters shanenigans have been added, I haven't found any (but I haven't compared 100% of them, so maybe I missed them), so it just sounded like a different presentation of the same content (like when the BFI includes a restored and an unrestored tracks for some of their Ozu releases).

The original Cantonese soundtrack sounds pretty authentic, except that one splicing error happened right after the cut footage: when Stool was waving at Tung Kwok-Man, who was hurrying off to do his black-faced ad gig, on the balcony the next morning, the soundtrack briefly switched to the ugly re-dub for a few seconds. It is present on the DVD at this point so I assume it's just an editing error on Spectrum's part.

The deleted scene is indeed presented as bonus material on the blu-ray disc. And the quality is genuine HD and soundtrack intact. If someone can insert that missing dialog back to the main feature we'll be in heaven. Actually, if someone, such as a local label, would release the entire film based on that unrestored HD master I'll happily take that as well (with a gentle color grading perhaps, since it looks a tiny bit too cyan now).

[Stefan Andersson]

Haus der Lügen, Lupu Pick
https://www.deutsche-kinemathek.de/en/v ... s%E2%80%99
https://www.arsenal-berlin.de/kino/prog ... -festival/
https://issuu.com/nasjonalbiblioteket/d ... s/17313505

Katzensteg, Lamprecht
https://www.arsenal-berlin.de/kino/prog ... -festival/
https://www.deutsche-kinemathek.de/syst ... 3%BCre.pdf (catalogue also w/ info about restored films by Stiller, Sjöström, Wegener, Rossellini, Akerman, Pabst plus Hotel des Acacias and other titles)
https://www.cinematheque.fr/film/146863.html
https://www.deutsche-kinemathek.de/de/b ... g%E2%80%B9
https://vimeo.com/473083353?turnstile=0 ... 3a53649282

[yoloswegmaster]

It looks like the next big restoration from the Film Heritage Foundation will be Sholay.

This is playing at Bologna next month and I can’t wait to see the results. The previous HD master was a monstrous 3D vandalisation so revisionist it would make George Lucas blush, so hopefully it undoes all of that. I hope they restored Sippy’s original, longer cut with the more violent ending too.

It looks like only the Director's Cut will be screening at Ritrovato. Here are the restoration notes for it:

Restored in 4K in 2025 by Film Heritage Foundation in collaboration with Sippy Films at L’Immagine Ritrovata laboratory, from an interpositive, two colour reversal intermediates and a second generation interpositive from 1978 provided by Sippy Films and preserved by Film Heritage Foundation. Audio restored from the original sound negative and the magnetic soundtrack preserved by Film Heritage Foundation. The Director’s Cut has been reconstructed including the original ending and two deleted scenes with the original 70mm aspect ratio

Here is a full programme list for this year's festival

[andyli]

Year after year Disney tempt us with a new set of Fox titles in new 4K restoration. It'll take forever for something like Duel in the Sun to hit 4K blu-ray, for instance.