Criterion Press Release: It's A Mad Mad Mad Mad World (Dual Format) (1 Viewer)

[haineshisway]

It was equally hard for me to keep MY mouth shut, but keep it shut I did. I was over at Foto-Kem briefly early on and met the nice lady from Criterion and spent an afternoon with her and Mr. Harris watching what was being done. Can't wait for January.

But here's the funniest thing about this, maybe funnier than the film itself - the person who was blowing a gasket in the other thread, whose health we were all worried about given his rants and postings - well, he's the only one who hasn't posted in this thread Go know.

Calling Joe Lugoff, calling Joe Lugoff!

 

[darkrock17]

Yep me too, this would be harder than keeping national secrets.

I wonder how long the NSA knew about this?

 

[pitchman]

Undoubtably. I never pay full price for Criterion. This will be the exception.

Actually, if you pre-order from Criterion, they're already offering it for $10 off - $39.96 !

 

[Todd J Moore]

We should edit the title of the thread to say THIS JUST IN: CRITERION LISTENS TO IT'S FORUM, CANCELS IAMMMMW. Joe's reaction would be classic.

I, too, will be buying this. I've only had a copy of the VHS extended version, so getting it on Blu will be sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeet!

 

[Robert Harris]

There will be no scenes discussed from these quarters.

RAH

 

[haineshisway]

Maybe now I can post the photograph I took at Foto-Kem of Mr. Harris standing by the big-boy transfer machine

 

[Robert Harris]

Maybe now I can post the photograph I took at Foto-Kem of Mr. Harris standing by the big-boy transfer machine

Keep in mind that, as I recall, I have one of you also.

RAH

 

[ahollis]

I wonder how long the NSA knew about this?

Properly longer than Ron did, but they did not understand the saying "Now for something a little less serious."

 

[Reed Grele]

An extra special THANK YOU to Mr. Robert A. Harris, Criterion, and ALL those involved for making this a reality!

P.S., RAH: If you'd care to stop by on Jan. 21st, You'll be served the largest chocolate fudge sundae with whipped cream and as many cherries as will fit on top that you've ever seen!

 

[haineshisway]

Let's see if this works:

 

[rich_d]

The more the merrier!

I just hope we're not buried under 4 feet of snow by then!

But ... that's why you've got the dogs ... for their snow skills

 

[Robert Harris]

Let's see if this works:

Boy, do I look beat...

RAH

 

[Moe Dickstein]

So heres a brief note on what I recall off the top of my noggin, RAH can correct any mistakes I make hopefully...About 6 weeks ago I was invited by Mr. Harris to come visit him at FotoKem where the work was being done on this new reconstruction. Criterion has had this in the works for quite some time and I believe it's a personal favorite of Peter Becker's. The situation with the missing footage is pretty dire. All that survive are various trims from 70mm prints from when the film was taken down to the shorter cut. Some scenes survive with picture and audio, but some only picture, and some only audio. All of the 70mm material has turned to magenta at this point and a good deal of it had already decomposed and warped past usability several years ago. On top of this, as was seen in the laserdisc, some shots were from "rectified" prints, which means that they were squeezed on the edges and stretched in the center to properly project onto a deeply curved Cinerama screen. Other trims were from a Japan-prepared print and had burned in subtitles!On the laserdisc, many scenes were reinstated, but not in the place they had been in the original cut. The rectified scenes were left distorted, continuous shots had scenes re-edited to hide the jump cuts due to missing frames, and the Japanese print material was zoomed in some 40% to avoid the subs. It was the best they could do at the time.Now, some 20 years later, the trims have turned totally magenta, the other color layers are gone. What remains is the resolution and the magnetic 6 track audio. Thankfully it seems the stereo channels were located otherwise, but the possibility was there to get some sound off those prints if it came to that. For this project every viable trim was scanned by FotoKem and aside from the color missing, they looked great. But how can you re-color shots? The secret is in the trims scanned 20 years ago. All that exists there is a 480 line color record. Robert Harris figured out a way to take that record and combine it with the new scans of the trims, giving as much color back to the shots as is possible.The secret is in technology developed to convert films to 3D. The computer program takes dozens of points across the identical frame in both versions, and then warps them together into perfect alignment. This also accounts for any unusual shrinkage in either element, and because the eye doesn't see color at the same resolution, having them combined gives a result that would have been impossible only a couple years ago. The only hitch is that the 480 material didn't cover the entire frame, so you will know those shots by a small fringe of black and white all around the borders. This is great from a reference standpoint though as you can really see the different amounts of frame exposed in different transfers. At FotoKem we could see the sprocket holes on the film, so you knew that was EVERYTHING in those scans. The most evident scenes are those with the Japanese subs, where only about 60% of the image will have color due to the zoom in done 20 years ago. Again, the result of this process was nothing short of jaw dropping to me.Other scenes which were missing audio I believe have had some work done, (RAH can you comment on how the missing audio scenes were handled?) Scenes existing in audio only have been reconstructed using a variety of stills in the style of A Star is Born, but this time there were a LOT more stills to work with than they had on that project so the result is hopefully better.All in all the run time of 197:40 with music means that only about 3 minutes of the full cut are missing from this reconstruction. Even now they are still finishing it up, adding frames of audio and such so that it is going to be the closest we will ever come to a full version and something most of us had given up all hope of ever seeing.It's been excruciating to keep quiet on this, but worth knowing that everyone was going to get this special gift.

 

[Robert Harris]

And Mr. K.

 

[Robert Harris]

An extra special THANK YOU to Mr. Robert A. Harris, Criterion, and ALL those involved for making this a reality!

P.S., RAH: If you'd care to stop by on Jan. 21st, You'll be served the largest chocolate fudge sundae with whipped cream and as many cherries as will fit on top that you've ever seen!

Beacon Falls...

Is that where Jimmy Stewart considered going off the bridge...

RAH

 

[Michael Rogers]

I always wondered why I saw Zooms in the laserdisc cut.

So heres a brief note on what I recall off the top of my noggin, RAH can correct any mistakes I make hopefully...About 6 weeks ago I was invited by Mr. Harris to come visit him at FotoKem where the work was being done on this new reconstruction. Criterion has had this in the works for quite some time and I believe it's a personal favorite of Peter Becker's.The situation with the missing footage is pretty dire. All that survive are various trims from 70mm prints from when the film was taken down to the shorter cut. Some scenes survive with picture and audio, but some only picture, and some only audio. All of the 70mm material has turned to magenta at this point and a good deal of it had already decomposed and warped past usability several years ago.On top of this, as was seen in the laserdisc, some shots were from "rectified" prints, which means that they were squeezed on the edges and stretched in the center to properly project onto a deeply curved Cinerama screen. Other trims were from a Japan-prepared print and had burned in subtitles!On the laserdisc, many scenes were reinstated, but not in the place they had been in the original cut. The rectified scenes were left distorted, continuous shots had scenes re-edited to hide the jump cuts due to missing frames, and the Japanese print material was zoomed in some 40% to avoid the subs. It was the best they could do at the time.Now, some 20 years later, the trims have turned totally magenta, the other color layers are gone. What remains is the resolution and the magnetic 6 track audio. Thankfully it seems the stereo channels were located otherwise, but the possibility was there to get some sound off those prints if it came to that.For this project every viable trim was scanned by FotoKem and aside from the color missing, they looked great. But how can you re-color shots? The secret is in the trims scanned 20 years ago. All that exists there is a 480 line color record. Robert Harris figured out a way to take that record and combine it with the new scans of the trims, giving as much color back to the shots as is possible.The secret is in technology developed to convert films to 3D. The computer program takes dozens of points across the identical frame in both versions, and then warps them together into perfect alignment. This also accounts for any unusual shrinkage in either element, and because the eye doesn't see color at the same resolution, having them combined gives a result that would have been impossible only a couple years ago. The only hitch is that the 480 material didn't cover the entire frame, so you will know those shots by a small fringe of black and white all around the borders. This is great from a reference standpoint though as you can really see the different amounts of frame exposed in different transfers. At FotoKem we could see the sprocket holes on the film, so you knew that was EVERYTHING in those scans. The most evident scenes are those with the Japanese subs, where only about 60% of the image will have color due to the zoom in done 20 years ago. Again, the result of this process was nothing short of jaw dropping to me.Other scenes which were missing audio I believe have had some work done, (RAH can you comment on how the missing audio scenes were handled?) Scenes existing in audio only have been reconstructed using a variety of stills in the style of A Star is Born, but this time there were a LOT more stills to work with than they had on that project so the result is hopefully better.All in all the run time of 197:40 with music means that only about 3 minutes of the full cut are missing from this reconstruction. Even now they are still finishing it up, adding frames of audio and such so that it is going to be the closest we will ever come to a full version and something most of us had given up all hope of ever seeing.It's been excruciating to keep quiet on this, but worth knowing that everyone was going to get this special gift.

 

[BendurTailpipe]

This is terrific news! I'll be asking Santa for a blu ray player this Christmas!
RAH, If we ever meet, the old fashioneds are on me!

 

[Steve Tannehill]

I also want to thank all those involved for making this the best release possible. When I saw that RAH was involved, I was ecstatic.Thanks TR for the fascinating look behind the scenes.And thanks Ron for providing a place where all fans can rejoice!

 

[Rob_Ray]

Thanks, T.R. I wanted to grill you like a cheese sandwich at the LA meetup, but I knew that my patience would be rewarded. Can't wait to place a preorder see the end result in January!

 

[Moe Dickstein]

Best news BT is that you get Blu and DVD in one package so you are already set then when you upgrade you've already got the HD!